Un­der pres­sure, Pe­ter Hecht splits Iron­wood in­to two biotechs, spin­ning out an R&D op­er­a­tion

Iron­wood $IR­WD is split­ting up its busi­ness in­to two dis­tinct halves, spin­ning out a pipeline of ear­ly- and mid-stage drugs in­to a sep­a­rate, pub­licly trad­ed biotech com­pa­ny while keep­ing its mar­ket­ed prod­ucts and re­lat­ed de­vel­op­ment projects in house at a scaled down, and more prof­itable, moth­er com­pa­ny. 

In a bid to cre­ate “two fo­cused, growth com­pa­nies,” CEO Pe­ter Hecht is keep­ing its two ap­proved drugs, lina­clotide (Linzess) and lesin­u­rad (Zu­rampic), at Iron­wood, along with IW-3718, an ex­per­i­men­tal ther­a­py for per­sis­tent gas­troe­sophageal re­flux dis­ease (GERD) with Phase III tri­als ex­pect­ed to launch in the third quar­ter of this year.

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