Sanofi hosted its Q2 ’19 earnings call and provided updates to its diabetes business unit including the recent Ph1 initiation for its GLP/GIP/GCG triple agonist (SAR441255). Unsurprisingly, Sanofi did not discuss its recent decision to terminate the Lexicon partnership for sotagliflozin. Below, FENIX provides diabetes-related highlights and insights from the call.
Senators Dick Durbin, Kevin Cramer, and Tina Smith introduced a new bipartisan bill called the Affordable Insulin Approvals Now Act, with the intention to accelerate approvals of generic insulin products. According to the sponsors, the new bill is intended to address the unintended consequence of the 2018 Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act which created a deadline (March 23, 2020) whereby all pending applications for generic insulin would be automatically rejected. Under the new bill, FDA would be required to continue the reviews of any pending applications. Below, FENIX provides thoughts on the Affordable Insulin Approvals Now Act in the context of the insulins that may be impacted by the March 23, 2020 cutoff date (e.g. Biocon/Mylan bs-glargine, Biocon/Mylan bs-aspart, Sanofi bs-aspart, and Sandoz bs-glargine which was in-licensed from Gan & Lee).