Scoop: As­cle­tis' NASH sub­sidiary scraps US PhII tri­al in fa­vor of Chi­na

Gan­nex Phar­ma, the NASH-fo­cused sub­sidiary of Chi­na’s As­cle­tis, has with­drawn a US-based Phase II tri­al orig­i­nal­ly slat­ed to be­gin in De­cem­ber 2023.

The biotech dis­closed on a fed­er­al clin­i­cal tri­al data­base that the tri­al was “can­celed due to busi­ness rea­sons.”

The up­date came just weeks af­ter the drug in­volved, an oral small mol­e­cule can­di­date and THRβ ag­o­nist named ASC41, be­came the sub­ject of a law­suit in which Viking Ther­a­peu­tics ac­cused As­cle­tis of steal­ing trade se­crets. But the de­ci­sion ac­tu­al­ly pre­dat­ed the law­suit, ac­cord­ing to a spokesper­son, who told End­points News that Gan­nex de­cid­ed at the end of 2021 not to pur­sue a US Phase II tri­al of ASC41.

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