Menarini and SciClone ink €115 M deal to address rising prevalence of AMR in China

21 September 2022 | News

Developing and commercializing Vaborem in China

Image credit: shutterstock

A. Menarini Asia-Pacific Holdings, part of The Menarini Group, and SciClone Pharmaceuticals (Holdings) have entered into an exclusive licensing agreement to develop and commercialize Vaborem (meropenem and vaborbactam) in the People's Republic of China (China).

This initiative serves to expand options to address the public health threat of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) infections, specifically carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales (CRE). Currently, Vaborem is being used to treat patients in the European Union for a variety of indications including complicated urinary tract infections (cUTI), complicated intra-abdominal infections (cIAI) and hospital-acquired pneumonia (HAP) and is approved in the United States of America to treat cUTI.

Vaborem is a fixed dose combination of a carbapenem and a novel boronic acid β-lactamase inhibitor of class A and class C serine β-lactamases. It protects meropenem from degradation by serine carbapenemases, restoring its activity against carbapenem-resistant strains and has been specifically developed to inhibit CRE including the commonly found Klebsiella pneumoniae Carbapenemase (KPC)-producing bacteria.

Under the License Agreement, Menarini will receive a total payment of up to €115 million including milestones and tiered royalty on sales. SciClone will be responsible for conducting and funding local clinical development as well as commercialization of Vaborem. To facilitate access to patients in China, SciClone will conduct local clinical trials and pursue applicable regulatory filings approvals in China.

Menarini acquired the exclusive rights from Melinta in 2018 to market and sell Vaborem (meropenem and vaborbactam) in 68 countries in Europe, the Commonwealth of Independent States and Asia-Pacific.