Sepracor turns attention to antidepressants
Firm looks to profit as market shifts from Prozac-like drugs
By Reuters | July 8, 2006
Sepracor Inc., a relatively small drug maker whose sleeping pill, Lunesta, has become one of the most recognizable brands on the market, plans to build on the drug's success to establish a portfolio of drugs directed at the central nervous system.
The company, which makes asthma drug Xopenex and is awaiting US approval for a drug to treat smoker's cough, sees its next big opportunity in the antidepressant market.
The Marlborough company, which has become the focus of intermittent takeover speculation, has two products in early to midstage development that it says will become the focus of its attention once its emphysema drug, arformoterol, is approved.
``The next big thing for us is definitely going to be these antidepressants," said David Southwell, Sepracor's chief financial officer. ``The potential market is very big."
The market for antidepressants is changing as generic competition cuts into sales of the class of drugs ushered in by Prozac, known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.
As sales of SSRIs fall, the sales of a newer generation of drugs that block the reuptake, and therefore increase the amount of the brain chemicals serotonin and norepinephrine, are growing. These drugs include Wyeth's Effexor and Eli Lilly & Co.'s Cymbalta.
``The next real battle in the antidepressant market will be among the serotonin-norepinephrine inhibitors," Southwell said.
Sepracor's experimental drug in this class is a modified -- and Sepracor claims improved -- version of Wyeth's newly tweaked version of Effexor XR. Wyeth's latest drug, called DVS-233, is currently awaiting US approval.
But Sepracor has another drug in early development called a triple reuptake inhibitor that it believes could, along with a drug being developed by GlaxoSmithKline PLC, herald the next wave in antidepressant treatment.
Triple reuptake inhibitors are designed to block the reuptake not only of serotonin and norepinephrine, but also of dopamine, one of two brain chemicals targeted by GlaxoSmithKline's antidepressant, Wellbutrin.
``If you get it right, there's no reason someone wouldn't want to take a triple reuptake inhibitor," Southwell said.
According to market research firm Decision Resources, 30 percent of patients with major depression who are taking drugs will be on a triple reuptake inhibitor by 2014, which would go a long way to supporting the broader depression market.
Sepracor shares have risen nearly 30 percent over the past 10 weeks, in part because of speculation the company may be acquired. Shares fell 81 cents yesterday to close at $55.05 in trading on the Nasdaq.
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