Pfizer has pumped the brakes on six early-stage assets, including three being tested for ulcerative colitis.
The Big Pharma has also ceased development of disitamab vedotin, an antibody-drug conjugate (ADC), in bladder cancer, with the company instead set to focus on approved ADC Padcev (enfortumab vedotin) in that setting, Chief Financial Officer David Denton said during Pfizer’s Feb. 3 earnings call (PDF).
Overall, the company’s pipeline adjustments during the fourth quarter resulted in $4.4 billion in impairment charges, Denton added. Disitamab vedotin is still being explored in other HER2-positive cancers, according to Pfizer’s website.
Pfizer picked up both Padcev and disitamab vedotin through its $43 billion buyout of Seagen in 2023. The pharma dropped two other Seagen ADCs last November, part of a group of 11 discontinuations at that time.
Despite this winnowing of its Seagen haul, Denton said that overall, “the Seagen portfolio is progressing ahead of our expectations.”
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The three newly dropped phase 1 colitis candidates are CCR6 antagonist PF-07054894, SIK inhibitor PF-07899895 and PF-06414300.
Two other assets headed to the scrap heap are PF-07853578, a PNPLA3 modulator that was being studied in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis, and anemia candidate PF-07940369. Pfizer has not yet disclosed the modalities of PF-06414300 and PF-07940369, a company spokesperson told Fierce.
At the time of publication, Pfizer had not responded to questions from Fierce about the reasons behind the culls or whether they represent a shift away from ulcerative colitis. Pfizer is currently less than a year in to an autoimmune disease collaboration with Flagship Pioneering, part of the duo’s broader multibillion-dollar partnership.
Pfizer also shelved a MASH program last quarter, a combo therapy of DGAT2i inhibitor ervogastat and acetyl-CoA carboxylase inhibitor clesacostat.
The final of the six newly dropped programs is a phase 1 combo of prifetrastat and atirmociclib in metastatic breast cancer. Both small molecules are still being developed as cancer monotherapies.
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Asked during Pfizer’s earnings call if more pipeline pruning is expected going forward, CEO Albert Bourla, Ph.D., said the company has “done most of our pruning of our pipeline right now.”
“The things that we are continuing right now, at large, are things that we believe they are the ones to invest,” Bourla said.
2025 was a year of prioritizing and focusing Pfizer’s portfolio, Chief Scientific Officer Chris Boshoff, M.D., Ph.D., added, which led to “up to $500 million savings in R&D, which is now reinvested in phase three programs.”
But that doesn’t mean Pfizer plans on setting its pipeline in stone, Bourla said.
“When you speak about realigning, creating synergies, or creating cost savings in R&D that we reinvest, we don’t mean going forward with this configuration of programs,” the chief exec said. Instead, Pfizer plans to increase its number of programs “by deploying AI, which already happened in 2025 with excellent results.”
