Eylea continues to lead AMD mkt despite new competition

Eylea leads market with sales of KRW 96.7 billion last year…up 20.2% YoY

Beovu’s sales exceed KRW 20 billion…Presence of Vabysmo and biosimilars like Lucentis yet minimal

The entry of new drugs in the macular degeneration treatment market made little impact on Eylea’s sales.

 

Eylea continued to top the macular degeneration treatment market last year, posting sales of KRW 96.7 billion.

 

The Eylea biosimilars Vabysmo and Lucentis, which were released last year, have shown little presence in the market yet.

 

According to the market research institution IQVIA on Thursday, Eylea’s revenue last year was KRW 96.7 billion, up 20.2% from the KRW 80.4 billion it had made in 2022.

 

Eylea is a vascular endothelial growth factor-A (VEGF-A) inhibitor for macular degeneration that was developed by Bayer and Regeneron.

 

The drug was approved in Korea in 2013 and entered the market in earnest the following year after receiving reimbursement approval.

 

Although Eylea’s sales were lower than that of its competitor Lucentis until 2015, the market demographic changed in Q3 2016.

 

Since then, Eylea’s sales have continued to grow, reaching KRW 46.8 billion in 2019, and then KRW 60.3 billion in 2020.

 

In 2022, it surpassed the KRW 80 billion mark and reached the KRW 100 billion mark the last year.

 

However, Eylea now has to fend off an onslaught of biosimilar competitors due to the expiration of its patent last month.

 

Celltrion, Samsung Bioepis, and Sam Chun Dang Pharm have all made a bid with their Eylea biosimilars.

 

The original developers, Bayer and Regeneron, are preparing to develop a higher-dose version of Eylea in preparation for the entry of biosimilars.

 

The companies plan to launch a higher-dose formulation to increase the dosing interval.

 

The two companies plan to seek approval for the higher-dose Eylea for all of their approved indications, including diabetic macular edema (DME), wet age-related macular degeneration (wAMD), and retinal vein occlusion.

 

Novartis’s Lucentis posted sales of KRW19.8 billion last year, down 20.2% from the previous year.

 

Lucentis’s sales have declined steadily since 2020, when it generated KRW 37 billion in sales.

 

In 2022, the company reported sales of KRW 29.4 billion, and even less, to record sales of less than KRW 20 billion last year.

 

Lucentis uses the same mechanism of action to inhibit VEGF-A as Eylea but has a shorter dosing interval.

 

Lucentis must be administered once a month, compared to Eylea, which can be administered once every two months.

 

Eylea’s efficacy had demonstrated superior vision improvement to Lucentis in patients with severe vision loss due to diabetic macular edema.

 

Therefore, Novartis plans to focus on marketing its next macular degeneration drug, Beovu.

 

Like Eylea, Beovu can be dosed once every 2 months.

 

Beovu, which was released in Korea in Q3 2021, generated sales of KRW 8.6 billion in the same year.

 

Since then, its sales have continued to grow, generating sales of KRW 16.5 billion in 2022 and KRW 21.3 billion last year.

 

Total sales of new drugs and biosimilars that entered the market last year amount to KRW 19 billion The Lucentis biosimilars and Roche's Vabysmo, which were newly launched last year, did not make much of an impact in the market the past year.

 

Chong Kun Dang’s LucenBS, which was the first Lucentis biosimilar to enter the market, sold KRW 500 million, and Amelivu, which is comarketed by Samsung Bioepis and Samil Pharm, sold KRW 800 million last year.

 

Chong Kun Dang sought to turn the atmosphere around with a price cut.

 

The company cut the price of Lucentis from KRW 300,000 to KRW 150,000 this month.

 

The original Lucentis costs KRW 580,000 per vial and Samsung Bioepis' Amelivu costs KRW 350,000 per vial.

 

Because its competitor has significantly reduced the price of its drug, attention is rising to what Samsung Bioepis will do in the next as well.

 

Vabysmo, which had gained great attention even before its launch, generated KRW 600 million in sales last year.

 

However, the real competition is expected to start this year, as Vabysmo was granted reimbursement in October last year.

 

Vabysmo is a macular degeneration treatment that was developed by Roche.

 

The drug not only inhibits VEGF but also blocks the angiopoietin-2 (Ang-2) pathway to inhibit neovascularization.

 

Blocking both pathways independently has been shown to be more effective than blocking VEGF alone in reducing inflammation, leakage, and abnormal blood vessel growth.

 

In particular, in clinical trials, Vabysmo improved visual acuity at a level non-inferior to that of Eylea in the TENAYA and LUCERNE trials that compared its safety and efficacy with Eylea.

 

Its duration of response lasted 24 months.

 

In other words, Vabysmo achieved comparable efficacy to other treatments with once every 4 months dosing compared to the once every 1-2 month dosing required for other treatments.

 

In the global market, Vabysmo’s sales are already closing in on that of Eylea.

 

Vabysmo generated approximately USD 3.56 trillion in global sales last year, more than half of Eylea’s $7.8 trillion, in just 2 years after its launch.