Originally Published
MX July/August 2002
BUSINESS NEWS
Medtronic and Abbott Partner on Stent Program
Playing catch-up in the race to capture a share of the rapidly developing market for drug-eluting vascular stents, Medtronic Inc. (Minneapolis) and Abbott Laboratories (Abbott Park, IL) have entered into a strategic partnership that promises to bring both companies to market sooner than either could have achieved on its own.
Under the partnership agreements, Abbott will grant Medtronic coexclusive access to its proprietary immunosuppression drug ABT-578 for use in Medtronic’s drug-eluting-stent program. Abbott’s ABT-578 is an analogue of the drug rapamycin, which has shown early promise in clinical trials of drug-eluting stents.
The agreements also call for Abbott to provide Medtronic with access to the phosphorylcholine (PC) coating it has licensed from Biocompatibles International plc (Farnham, Surrey, UK) for use in conjunction with ABT-578. PC is a biocompatible polymer copy of the outside surface of a red blood cell that mimics the structure of the natural cell membrane. Preclinical studies suggest that the coating may act as a versatile, biologically inert drug-eluting platform.
For its part of the agreement, Medtronic will grant Abbott access to its current over-the-wire stent-delivery systems (worldwide), its rapid-exchange stent-delivery systems (outside the United States), and the company’s new stent-delivery system that is currently undergoing preclinical testing.
The agreement permits Medtronic to maintain exclusive market rights to its line of modular stents, and gives it the four major components (stent, delivery system, polymer, and drug) needed to enhance its drug-eluting-stent program.
If the move works, both Medtronic and Abbott will have taken a gigantic leap toward catching up with key competitors Guidant Corp. (Indianapolis), Boston Scientific Corp. (Natick, MA), and Cordis Corp. (Miami), a Johnson & Johnson company. Whether the partnership can move quickly enough to make up for lost time, however, remains to be seen.
According to industry watchers, even with a successful partnership, Abbott and Medtronic are at least two years away from being able to sell drug-coated stents. If licensing and litigation issues continue to slow the competition, however, the partners could find themselves back in the race.
Copyright ©2002 MX
