Sanofi to advance diabetes combo drug trials in 2014

French pharmaceutical company Sanofi has announced that late-stage tests for a pen-shaped device that combines two diabetes treatments are expected to start in the first half of 2014.
The device, called LixiLa, combines Sanofi’s blockbuster medicine Lantus (insulin glargine) with its new GLP-1 analogue Lyxumia. It is hoped the new combination treatment will help diabetes patients control blood sugar levels better than each therapy alone.
“The expected landscape in the US has changed and this should … allow LixiLan to be the first fixed-ratio combination of basal insulin and GLP-1 in the US market,” Hugo Fry, who heads the development programme for Lyxumia at Sanofi, told investors on Monday.
Sanofi also said it plans to seek regulatory approval in the US and Europe for its successor to Lantus during the first half of next year.
U300 is a new, more concentrated formulation of insulin glargine that is designed to improve patient control and adherence due to a more consistent release and less frequent dosing.
At the recent American Diabetes Association congress in Chicago, Sanofi reported encouraging results from the product’s first late-stage (phase III) trial, which demonstrated equivalent blood sugar control with fewer night-time episodes of hypoglycemia compared to Lantus.
Pierre Chancel, senior vice-president for global diabetes at Sanofi, said the company could be in a position to start selling U300 insulin glargine in 2015.