Thousand Oaks, Calif.-based pharmaceutical company Amgen will acquire ChemoCentryx and its autoimmune drug, Tavneos, for an all-cash payment of $3.7 billion, according to an Aug. 4 news release from Amgen.
Each company's board of directors approved the acquisition.
The FDA approved Tavneos, the brand name for the generic avacopan, in October 2021, to be an additional treatment for adult patients with a severe, rare condition in which the immune system attacks blood vessels. In a clinical trial, Tavneos had a 65.7 remission rate among study participants.
The oral drug is "a transformative, first-in-class treatment for ANCA-associated vasculitis," Robert Bradway, Amgen's CEO and chairman, stated in the news release.
Mr. Bradway said he was excited about the Taveneos launch and helping more patients with the sometimes life-threatening immune system disease.
Active-neutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibody-associated vasculitis affects about 200 million people, according to the FDA.