New Remicade biosimilar approved, but Pfizer denies plans for commercialization

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved Pfizer’s (NYSE: PFE) biosimilar drug Ixifi (infliximab-qbtx), which references the big-selling inflammatory diseases drug Remicade.

The US pharma giant already has an approved Remicade biosimilar, Inflectra, as part of a partnership with the South Korean biopharmaceutical firm Celltrion (Kosdaq: 068270).

When Pfizer acquired Inflectra in 2015, it decided not to stop development of Ixifi, even though it was behind Inflectra, which was approved by the FDA in April 2016, in the regulatory process.