Better than standard treatments but still losing out to competitors Immuneering (IMRX.US) pancreatic cancer treatment phase 2 data fell 21% after the market

The Zhitong Finance App learned that biotech company Immuneering Corp. (IMRX.US) plummeted about 21% in post-market trading on Wednesday after announcing the results of a phase 2a clinical trial of atebimetinib as a first-line treatment for pancreatic cancer.

The company reported an overall 12-month survival rate of 64% for patients treated with atebimetinib combined with an improved gemcitabine/albumin combination paclitaxel. The company notes that the current 12-month overall survival rate benchmark for standard treatment is 35%.

Furthermore, the total 12-month remission rate for this combination was 39% compared to 23% for standard therapy. The median progression-free survival was 8.5 months, which is superior to 5.5 months with standard therapy. Immuneering specifically indicated that only two grade 3 adverse events, namely neutropenia and anemia, were observed in more than 10% of patients.

Although atebimetinib's data is performing well, investors may compare it to other first-line pancreatic cancer treatments in development, such as Verastem's Avutometinib combined with Defactinib regimen and Revolution Medicines' daraxonarasib. Among them, the total remission rate previously reported by avutometinib combination therapy reached 83%, while daraxonarasib was 55%. However, the median follow-up time for the results announced by Verastem and Revolution Medicines was relatively short.