Pharmaceuticals
A study by the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development (CSDD) has found that the number of cancer drugs in clinical development has more than doubled between 1990 and 2006. However, only 8% of these drug candidates received marketing approval during the studied period. When broken down by compound type, market approval percentages were 10% for small molecule compounds, 9% for all types of monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and 14% for humanized mAbs. Of these compound types, mAbs were least likely to make the transition from Phase 1 to Phase 2 trials or from Phase 2 to Phase 3, but most likely to move from Phase 3 trials to FDA review and from FDA review to market approval. The study examined 1,111 cancer therapeutic or vaccine candidates that were developed or licensed by biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies.
Source: Tufts CSDD