Study: Bayer drug helps liver cancer patients

CHICAGO (CNNMoney.com) -- Nexavar, an approved kidney cancer drug developed by Onyx Pharmaceuticals and Bayer AG, is also effective in prolonging the survival of liver cancer patients, according to a new study.

Liver cancer patients taking the pill Nexavar outlived patients who did not take the drug by nearly three months, according to late-stage study results announced Monday at the annual conference of the American Society for Clinical Oncology.

Onyx's stock rose 6 percent on the news.

That study focused on 602 liver cancer patients around the world. Patients who took Nexavar survived an average of 10.7 months, compared to placebo patients, who lived for an average of 7.9 months.

Emeryville, Calif.-based Onyx (Charts) and Germany's Bayer (Charts) are preparing to submit applications to the Food and Drug Administration and European regulators for approval to market Nexavar as a liver cancer drug.

If successful, the companies said, Nexavar, would be the first effective treatment in prolonging the life spans of liver cancer patients.

Hollings Renton, chief executive of Onxy, told CNNMoney.com that he hopes to have Nexavar FDA-approved as a liver cancer drug by early 2008.

"We would like to say we're curing cancer but that's not what's happening today," said Renton. "We are looking to turn cancer into more of a chronic disease so that patients can live longer with their disease and have a better quality of life."

A researcher in the study, Dr. Josep Llovet of the Barcelona Liver Cancer Group and the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, said the "unprecedented" study results support Nexavar's use as a new "standard of care" for previously untreated liver cancer patients. Llovet said there are no other drugs that significantly prolong life patients with this type of cancer.

Charles Duncan, analyst for the investment research firm JMP Securities, said the study results could help to boost annual Nexavar sales by about $750 million, in a best-case scenario. But that partly depends on the drug's ability to compete with other cancer drugs, like Genentech's Avastin and Pfizer's Sutent, said Duncan.

Nexavar is also being studied as a potential treatment for lung and breast cancer and melanoma.

The partners Onyx and Bayer released Nexavar as a kidney cancer drug in the U.S. and Europe in 2006. In its first year on the market, Nexavar revenues came to $165 million. Sales in the first quarter of 2007 exceeded $60 million.

Unlike Bayer with its market cap of more than $55 billion, Onyx is a relatively small company with a market cap of $1.4 billion that is losing money. Because Nexavar is Onyx's sole product, expanding its use to other forms of cancer is critical.

Duncan does not have a formal recommendation for Onyx, and he has no investment relationship with the company.