Drug­mak­ers take to Japan: 3 new drug ap­provals won by As­traZeneca, Mer­ck, and EA Phar­ma

Fri­day morn­ing came with three new drug ap­provals in Japan, in­clud­ing one from a multi­bil­lion dol­lar col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween phar­ma gi­ants As­traZeneca $AZN and Mer­ck $MRK.

The duo won a reg­u­la­to­ry nod for Lyn­parza — now the first PARP in­hibitor to be ap­proved in Japan — and for asth­ma drug Fasen­ra.

Lyn­parza was the first PARP in­hibitor to hit the mar­ket here in the US, and As­traZeneca fol­lowed up on the ac­cel­er­at­ed OK with more stud­ies demon­strat­ing its ef­fec­tive­ness in ovar­i­an can­cer. In Au­gust, the drug won FDA ap­proval to be used for re­cur­rent ovar­i­an can­cer, re­gard­less of BR­CA mu­ta­tion sta­tus.

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