Calithera Gets FDA Fast Track Designation For Sapanisertib For Squamous Lung Cancer Treatment

(RTTNews) - The U.S. Food & Drug Administration has granted Fast Track designation for Calithera Biosciences Inc.'s (CALA) investigational mTORC 1/2 inhibitor sapanisertib (CB-228) for the treatment of adult patients with unresectable or metastatic squamous non-small cell lung cancer or sqNSCLC whose tumors have a mutation in nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor (NFE2L2, also called NRF2) and who have received prior platinum-based chemotherapy and immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy, the company said in a statement.

The FDA grants Fast Track designation to facilitate development and expedite the review of therapies with the potential to treat a serious condition where there is an unmet medical need.

A therapeutic that receives Fast Track designation can benefit from early and frequent communication with the agency, in addition to a rolling submission of the marketing application, with potential pathways for expedited approval that have the objective of getting important new therapies to patients more quickly.

Calithera's ongoing Phase 2 trial is a multi-center, open-label study of sapanisertib monotherapy in patients with NRF2-mutated sqNSCLC whose disease has progressed on or after platinum-doublet chemotherapy and immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy (anti-PD/L1) with or without anti-CTLA-4.

The study is evaluating sapanisertib 2 mg twice a day or 3 mg once a day in patients with sqNSCLC harboring either wild-type (WT) or mutated NRF2, as detected by next-generation sequencing.