As­traZeneca's Calquence nabs an­oth­er win against Im­bru­vi­ca, but Eli Lil­ly is on its heels

Three years af­ter first launch­ing Calquence as a sec­ond gen­er­a­tion BTK in­hibitor, As­traZeneca con­tin­ues to tout new da­ta to com­pete with J&J and Ab­b­Vie’s first gen­er­a­tion block­buster Im­bru­vi­ca.

The British phar­ma an­nounced on Mon­day that Calquence passed a head-to-head Phase III study against Im­bru­vi­ca in chron­ic lym­pho­cyt­ic leukemia, prov­ing non-in­fe­ri­or — i.e. just as good — as the old­er drug. Al­though As­traZeneca did not break down any of the num­bers, they said the drug proved su­pe­ri­or on safe­ty, trig­ger­ing few­er cas­es of atri­al fib­ril­la­tion, an ir­reg­u­lar heart­beat that can lead to stroke or heart fail­ure.

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