No­var­tis dumps AveX­is pro­gram for Rett syn­drome af­ter fail­ing re­peat round of pre­clin­i­cal test­ing

Say good­bye to AVXS-201.

The Rett syn­drome gene ther­a­py drug made by AveX­is — the biotech that was bought, kept sep­a­rate, then re­named and fi­nal­ly ab­sorbed by No­var­tis in­to its R&D di­vi­sion — has been dropped by the bio­phar­ma.

In No­var­tis’ third quar­ter fi­nan­cial re­port, the phar­ma had found that pre­clin­i­cal da­ta did not sup­port de­vel­op­ment of the gene ther­a­py in­to IND-en­abling tri­als and be­yond. The an­nounce­ment comes a year af­ter No­var­tis told the Rett So­ci­ety how ex­cit­ed it was by the drug — and its po­ten­tial ben­e­fits and us­es.

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