Hit by 2 more flops, Bris­tol My­ers and Nek­tar wind down IL-2/PD-1 pro­gram at the cen­ter of $3.6B deal

Four years af­ter Bris­tol My­ers Squibb paid a record-break­ing $1.85 bil­lion in cash to part­ner with Nek­tar Ther­a­peu­tics and launch a sprawl­ing clin­i­cal pro­gram to test its IL-2 drug in com­bi­na­tion with the phar­ma gi­ant’s an­chor­ing PD-1 in­hibitor, the com­pa­nies are call­ing it quits.

The glob­al de­vel­op­ment pro­gram for be­m­pe­galdesleukin plus Op­di­vo will come to an end in what BMS and Nek­tar de­scribed as a joint de­ci­sion, they an­nounced on Thurs­day in the wake of two more neg­a­tive late-stage read­outs.

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