Pre­dict­ing which of the cur­rent block­busters will as­cend to new heights is any­one’s game, and one that high­lights the cur­rent dy­nam­ics of the in­dus­try. On Fri­day it’s Glob­al­Da­ta’s turn to pick out the ther­a­pies that it be­lieves will come out on top in some in­tense­ly com­pet­i­tive spaces.

Hu­mi­ra may still top the chart for best-sell­ing drugs in the world, but Keytru­da is set to over­take the shrink­ing fran­chise in around five years time — with four oth­er drugs set to get ahead of Ab­b­Vie’s biggest cash cow.

The $22.2 bil­lion es­ti­mate for Keytru­da is among the high­est num­ber put for­ward by an­a­lysts. Eval­u­ate pegged world­wide sales in 2024 at $17 bil­lion, while Mizuho’s Mara Gold­stein’s fore­cast was that it would sur­pass $20 bil­lion by then.

Mer­ck’s R&D en­gine — which has pumped out a se­ries of clin­i­cal wins en­abling new fil­ings — is cru­cial to its growth, ac­cord­ing to Glob­al­Da­ta phar­ma an­a­lyst Ke­shali­ni Sabarat­nam. Just days ago the phar­ma gi­ant cel­e­brat­ed an­oth­er mile­stone in the form of an OK in Chi­na for front­line non-small cell lung can­cer.

“It has re­ceived mar­ket ap­provals for over 20 on­col­o­gy in­di­ca­tions in the US, and is con­tin­u­ing to ex­pand in­to new in­di­ca­tions and mar­kets glob­al­ly,” she said in a state­ment.

What Bris­tol-My­ers Squibb lagged in Op­di­vo 2025 sales, though, it is like­ly mak­ing up in num­bers. The #2, #3 and #4 drugs on the list will be its by then, in­clud­ing the blood thin­ner Eliquis ($18.7 bil­lion), Cel­gene’s mul­ti­ple myelo­ma drug Revlim­id ($12.4 bil­lion), and the PD-1 check­point ($12 bil­lion).

J&J’s Im­bru­vi­ca comes next at $11.9 bil­lion, with an­a­lysts en­cour­aged by the BTK in­hibitor’s use in mul­ti­ple can­cers as well as chron­ic graft-ver­sus-host-dis­ease.

Bik­tarvy’s #6 po­si­tion just af­ter Hu­mi­ra con­tin­ues to un­der­score Gilead’s dom­i­nance in the HIV mar­ket, with $10 bil­lion pen­ciled in.

An­a­lysts al­so ap­pear un­fazed by the threats posed by ri­val CDK4/6 drugs from No­var­tis and Eli Lil­ly against Pfiz­er’s Ibrance, just trail­ing Bik­tarvy. While the drug on­ly gar­nered $2.8 bil­lion in 2018, the pre­dict­ed 2024 sales is as high as $9 bil­lion.

Round­ing out the list are J&J’s Ste­lara and Eli Lil­ly’s Trulic­i­ty, the on­ly rep­re­sen­ta­tives in the crowd­ed pso­ri­a­sis and di­a­betes field, which are filled with oth­er block­buster con­tenders.

While the US biosimilars industry has generally been a disappointment since its inception, with FDA approving 33 biosimilars since 2015, just a fraction of those have immediately followed their approvals with launches. And more than a handful of biosimilars for two of the biggest blockbusters of all time — AbbVie’s Humira and Amgen’s Enbrel — remain approved by FDA but still have not launched because of legal settlements.

Kura Oncology is clear to resume studies for its early-stage leukemia program after the FDA lifted a clinical hold Thursday afternoon.

Regulators had placed the hold on a Phase Ib study of KO-539, an experimental oral treatment for some genetic subsets of acute myeloid leukemia last November after a patient died while taking the drug. Kura expects to begin enrolling patients again imminently, CEO Troy Wilson told Endpoints News.