Arrowhead Research Corp improving focus, say Edison analysts

Last year’s acquisition of Roche’s RNAi (RNA interference) business (The Pharma Letter October 25, 2011) makes USA-based nano-medicine developer Arrowhead Research Corp (Nasdaq: ARWR) one of the leaders in RNAi and delivery solutions for RNAi, note analysts at Edison Investment Research.

Moreover, they say, the recent acquisition of Alvos Therapeutics (TPL April 12) adds a library of homing peptides, also aimed at developing targeted therapeutics, with or without the use of RNAi. This will speed up development of new projects both for partnering and in-house development. The most advanced projects in-house are a first-in-class obesity compound and an RNAi compound for solid tumors (both Phase I), valued at $60 million. The value of the platform technology is not included in this figure.

The Alvos acquisition for around $2 million in shares transforms Arrowhead into a powerful platform company for targeted delivery, making it an attractive development partner. This should accelerate near-term licensing deals as seen already by this week’s agreement with US drug giant Merck & Co to evaluate an antibody candidate acquired through Alvos.