Bukwang Pharmaceutical said Tuesday that it has finished enrolling patients for the phase 2 clinical trials of MLR-1023, a type 2 diabetes treatment co-developed with Melior Discovery, a U.S. biopharmaceutical company.

A total of 400 people with type-2 diabetes at 61 hospitals in the United States and Korea will participate in phase 2 clinical trial for MLR-1023. The patient registration started in September 2017, and the company managed to complete the registration this month.

The company expects to complete the phase 2 clinical trial by the end of this year and plans to present the results early next year.

MLR-1023 has been in clinical trials in the U.S. and Korea since the company decided to develop the treatment into a global drug. Bukwang had completed initial phase 2 clinical trial and presented its result at the American Diabetes Association.

The results showed that the treatment significantly decreased postprandial blood glucose and fasting blood glucose levels and also showed considerable weight loss in some patients.

In the case of diabetes treatments, new therapeutic agents, such as DPP-4 inhibitors, GLP-1 analogs, and SGLT-2 inhibitors, have been leading the market. If Bukwang succeeds in developing MLR-1023, the first in class drug for the Lyn Kinase category, an insulin sensitizer, the company expects an annual sale of more than $3 trillion.

“We will step up efforts to advance to the global market by developing MLR-1023 and other new drugs,” a company official said.

corea022@docdocdoc.co.kr

<© Korea Biomedical Review, All rights reserved.>