The European Commission has approved Sobi’s drug Aspaveli® (pegcetacoplan) for broader use in adults with paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH), a rare blood disorder. Initially, Aspaveli® was only indicated for patients who still had anemia after receiving other treatments, but can now be prescribed to treatment-naive adults with PNH.
Penn licensee Apellis Pharmaceuticals has a strategic collaboration with Sobi focusing on the co-development and commercialization of systemic pegcetacoplan. Under this collaboration, Sobi has obtained global co-development rights and exclusive commercialization rights outside the US for systemic pegcetacoplan, while Apellis retains the US commercialization rights for this therapy and worldwide rights for its ophthalmological use.
Both of the approved products developed and marketed by Apellis Pharmaceuticals and its partners, SYFOVRE® and EMPAVELI® (pegcetacoplan), are based on compstatin complement-inhibiting peptides discovered at Penn in the laboratory of John Lambris, Ph.D., the Dr. Ralph and Sallie Weaver Professor of Research Medicine in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine in the Perelman School of Medicine. Read more here.