Takeda Keeps Busy Despite Actos Side Effects Lawsuits

Takeda’s recent purchase is of LigoCyte Pharmaceutical, building on the vaccine business launched last year.  LigoCyte is currently developing a norovirus vaccine designed to prevent gastroenteritis, better known as the stomach flu, according to the Wall Street Journal.

In April, Takeda announced a purchase of Philadelphia-based URL Pharma for $800 million upfront, plus potential for additional future payments. The deal secured the gout drug known as Colcrys, which earned URL $430 million last year. Though Japan is looking more enticing to U.S. and European pharmaceutical companies, similar to other pharmaceutical companies, Takeda has been looking beyond its own borders to purchase companies with new drugs to offset losses incurred from their own domestic markets.  Takeda purchased Millennium Pharmaceuticals for $8.8 billion in 2008 and Switzerland’s Nycomed for $13.7 billion last year.

Anna Protopapas is Takeda’s global head of business development. In an interview with FierceBiotech, she suggested future deals were in the works for its vaccine business.

“Vaccines are an important new area,” said Protopapas. She indicated that the company would likely expand their interests with little change to the parent company in the foreseeable future.

Actos Loses Patent Protection as the Number of Actos Lawsuits Continues to Rise

In, August, one of Takeda’s top sellers, Actos, lost protection on its patent. Even though it isn’t a big name brand name like Lipitor or Plavix, Actos has earned the U.S. market a whopping $3 billion plus in sales at its peak. It also earned the U.S. market a total sum of $16 million in revenue since it was brought on the market in 1999. Eighteen percent of Takeda’s 2011 revenue is due to Actos, while 51.8% of its U.S. revenue is due to Actos.

Actos Lawsuits Claim Takeda Aggressively Marketed Actos Despite Severe Side Effects

Actos is a very popular Type 2 diabetes treatment on the market today. However, since it has now been linked to bladder cancer as a potential side effect, the number of Actos lawsuits has been on the rise as well. One of the common complaints in these Actos lawsuits is that Takeda continued to market the drug in an aggressive manner despite knowing as early as 2009 that potentially fatal side effects could result from the use of Actos.

Besides bladder cancer, Actos is also known for causing severe cardiovascular side effects, including an elevated risk of heart attacks. However, at the buying rate that Takeda has been demonstrating, it does not seem as if they are concerned about the growing number of Actos side effects lawsuits being filed against them or the financial effects of those Actos lawsuits.