Mer­ck takes home an FDA win for a Roger Perl­mut­ter fa­vorite, po­ten­tial­ly crack­ing open big mar­ket

With PD-(L)1 drug Keytru­da dom­i­nat­ing the port­fo­lio, erst­while Mer­ck R&D head Roger Perl­mut­ter at­tempt­ed to put the drug­mak­er on good foot­ing with a $2.2 bil­lion buy­out of Pelo­ton Ther­a­peu­tics back in 2019. The key­stone drug in that deal is now bear­ing fruit — and even more wins could be on the way.

The FDA on Fri­day ap­proved Mer­ck’s belzu­ti­fan — soon to be mar­ket­ed as Welireg — a hy­pox­ia-in­ducible fac­tor in­hibitor for the treat­ment of pa­tients with von Hip­pel-Lin­dau (VHL)-as­so­ci­at­ed re­nal cell car­ci­no­ma, CNS he­man­gioblas­tomas or pan­cre­at­ic neu­roen­docrine tu­mors, the agency said in a re­lease.

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