There's another big loser in the inhaled insulin game. Shares of Novo Nordisk were trimmed more than four percent after the Danish developer announced it was dropping its short-acting AERx insulin inhaler after coming to the conclusion that it had little commercial value and was no better than injectable insulin. The AERx inhaler was in late-stage trials.
Company officials said they would trim hundreds of jobs and write off $260 million as a result of the move. Pfizer dropped Exubera last fall after the inhaled diabetes product failed to live up to, or even get close to, a much heralded blockbuster status. Novo says it will continue to develop other experimental inhaled diabetes therapies. That's not likely to be any consolation to Novo's workers at its Hayward, CA facility, where about 300 employees face the axe.
- see Novo's release
- read the report from Dow Jones
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