April 24, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] A series of license deal cancellations that hit Hanmi Pharmaceutical is leading to growing concerns about the drug maker’s pipelines and ongoing partnership with foreign companies.

In the last three months, Hanmi has faced setbacks in global license and drug development agreements with global pharmaceutical giants including Sanofi, Janssen and Boehringer Ingelhem.

Shares of Hanmi plunged over 52 percent since its deal with Boehringer Ingelhem over a cancer treatment fell through in September, wiping 3.27 trillion won (US$2.72 billion) from its market capitalization.

Industry watchers point out that investors may have painted a very rosy picture on Hanmi’s tech capability and export performance.

Lapscovery, Hanmi’s exclusive platform technology designed to prolong the duration of action of biologics, is especially raising doubts as export deals involved with the technology have been collapsed.

Following Jansen’s suspension on recruiting of clinical patients for a novel diabetes drug which it had licensed from Hanmi, Sanofi also returned the development and commercialization rights for one of the three diabetes treatments.

Both of the two drug candidates are based on Lapscovery technology.

“The two events raised concerns that the contracting parties’ credibility on the technology is in question,” an industry source said.

Kim Hyun-wook, an analyst at BNK Securities said that the Korean pharmaceutical company can survive if it shows clearly better marketability than existing drugs.

“The technology of Hanmi Pharma is not a technology to develop new drugs completely, but a technology that improves the efficacy of existing drugs,” Kim said.

Some argue that market concerns and share price falls are excessive.

The drug development process involves a series of lengthy steps until a single medication eventually hits the market, leading to modifications of contracts or even terminations, what Hanmi calls them “growing pains.”

“Failures naturally occur in the new drug development process,” said Noh Kyung-chul, an analyst at SK Investment & Securities.

Market expectation on Hanmi’s technology remains high due to ongoing contracts for other pipeline drugs such as a $910 million deal with Genentech over phase 1 trials for cancer candidate HM95573, he said.

By Park Han-na (hnpark@heraldcorp.com)