ADM Korea, a subsidiary of Hyundai Bioscience, has announced that the first clinical trial target population for its niclosamide-based oral metabolic anticancer drug will be ‘prostate cancer patients resistant to hormone therapy.’

The niclosamide-based metabolic anticancer drug not only regulates the metabolic pathways of cancer cells to induce their death but also blocks the signaling pathways of cancer cells that avoid anticancer effects, thus inhibiting drug resistance.

The biggest challenge in anti-cancer treatment is solving the problem of cancer cell drug resistance, but no drug has yet been developed to address this. 

Due to the longstanding issues of low absorption and short half-life, niclosamide has not been repurposed as an anticancer drug over the past 60 years.

CNPharm, which plans to enter into an exclusive license agreement with ADM Korea, has overcome this issues with its patented technology, successfully repurposing niclosamide as an oral metabolic anticancer drug.

Initially, in August, ADM Korea will submit an IND to the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety of the Republic of Korea for a clinical study combining hormone therapy and the niclosamide-based metabolic anticancer drug in prostate cancer patients resistant to hormone therapy. 

According to a recent paper published in the Lancet, the number of prostate cancer patients worldwide is expected to more than double from 1.4 million in 2020 to 2.9 million in 2040. The global prostate cancer market is predicted to reach approximately 29.8 trillion KRW by 2025.