Bayer has struck a deal to buy Perfuse Therapeutics for $300 million upfront. The buyout, which includes up to $2.15 billion in milestones, will give Bayer control of an eye disease implant that Perfuse linked to improved outcomes in a pair of phase 2 trials last year.
San Francisco-based Perfuse is focused on PER-001, an intravitreal implant that delivers an endothelin antagonist to the eye. Endothelin-1, a vasoconstrictor, is upregulated in glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration. By blocking endothelin signaling, PER-001 could improve blood flow and prevent cell death in the retinas of patients with the eye diseases.
Bayer has identified the drug candidate as a good fit for its capabilities. The German drugmaker sells the Regeneron-partnered anti-VEGF drug Eylea in Europe for the treatment of multiple eye diseases. Eylea is Bayer’s biggest drug, generating 3.1 billion euros ($3.7 billion) last year.
The drug is coming toward the end of its lifecycle and sales fell last year, but Bayer has lacked a successor. The company’s cell therapy unit BlueRock Therapeutics started a phase 1/2a study in primary photoreceptor diseases last year, but its late-phase pipeline skews toward cancer and cardiovascular and renal disease.
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Buying Perfuse will give Bayer a more advanced eye disease drug candidate. Perfuse reported phase 2 data on PER-001 in glaucoma and diabetic retinopathy last year. While primarily designed to evaluate the safety of PER-001, the studies generated early evidence that the drug candidate improves vision.
At the time, Perfuse outlined plans to start larger and longer pivotal trials in both indications in the back half of 2025. However, there are currently no phase 3 studies on the federal trials database that name PER-001 as the intervention or Perfuse as the sponsor. The candidate is in phase 2, Bayer said in the press release about the takeover, which lacks a timeline for further development.
