Posted on behalf of Heidi Ledford

Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche has decided to cut its HIV research programme.

In a letter sent to HIV specialists last Wednesday (Reuters), the company announced that its current HIV pipeline was unlikely to improve upon currently available therapies. Researchers presently working on HIV will be assigned to other projects, a company spokeswoman said.

The decision would seem to draw Roche’s disappointing history with HIV research to a close. The company is widely viewed as an important innovator in the field, yet never quite managed to reap the benefits of its innovations. An early candidate, called Hivid (zalcitabine) was among the first antiretrovirals to win approval but was so toxic that few chose to use it. It was abandoned in 2005. Another drug, Fuzeon (enfuvirtide) was the first approved drug to prevent HIV fusion with target cells, but it was difficult to use (it had to be injected) and expensive, and was quickly shoved aside by drugs that later appeared on the market.

Some AIDS activists have expressed dismay at Roche’s decision to withdraw from the field (Financial Times). Roche says they will focus their efforts in virology on diseases “in which we can deliver substantial improvements over existing medicines.” AIDSmeds.com says that hepatitis C is one such disease. (That’s no easy field either: eight hepatitis C drugs were abandoned or suspended last year alone.)

But it’s also understandable that Roche might want to tighten its belts. Many pharmaceutical companies are taking a hard look at winnowing down their pipelines. Those with promising drugs use them to seed new companies. A few recent examples: GlaxoSmithKline’s CEO has said the company may spin off early drug candidates from its abandoned urinary and reproductive systems research project (Wall Street Journal); AstraZeneca took a similar approach with its gastro-intestinal disease research group; and Pfizer has recently spun off some of its research projects in Japan (IN VIVO).

Image: FDA