J&J hus­tles Leg­end’s promis­ing BC­MA CAR-T in­to PhI/II tri­al, win­ning an FDA green light to be­gin re­cruit­ing pa­tients

Af­ter spend­ing $350 mil­lion in cash to lay its hands on rights to Nan­jing-based Leg­end Biotech’s promis­ing BC­MA CAR-T LCAR-B38M (JNJ-68284528), the phar­ma gi­ant will now hus­tle it in­to an FDA-ap­proved Phase Ib/II tri­al for mul­ti­ple myelo­ma with an eye to snag­ging an ac­cel­er­at­ed OK.

The drug — un­der re­view in Chi­na — emerged from left field a year ago at AS­CO, turn­ing heads with ex­treme­ly promis­ing da­ta that ex­ecs at ri­val blue­bird bio dissed as a like­ly out­come of the pa­tient pop­u­la­tion that was se­lect­ed for the small study. J&J, though, went a long way to val­i­dat­ing the pro­gram with its col­lab­o­ra­tion deal, help­ing make this one of the most close­ly-fol­lowed drugs in the in­dus­try pipeline, along­side bb2121 from blue­bird and Cel­gene.

Unlock this article instantly by becoming a free subscriber.

You’ll get access to free articles each month, plus you can customize what newsletters get delivered to your inbox each week, including breaking news.

SIGN UP LOG IN BECOME A PREMIUM SUBSCRIBER