Sage Therapeutics Scraps Alzheimer’s Drug Development After Trial Fails

(Reuters) -Sage Therapeutics said on Tuesday it would stop developing its experimental drug, dalzanemdor, for Alzheimer’s disease after it failed to meet the main goal of a late-stage trial, sending its shares down 10% in premarket trading.

The failed drug trial comes months after the company stopped developing the same drug as a treatment for Parkinson’s disease.

Another treatment by the company for a separate neurological disorder also failed recently and its stock has fallen nearly 70% this year.

Its shares were trading at $5.99 before the opening bell.

Stifel analyst Paul Matteis said the Alzheimer’s study was viewed to be “high-risk” due to the previous trial, but the failure removes an upside source for shares.

In the trial of 174 patients, dalzanemdor did not show a statistically significant difference in a test that measures intelligence, compared to a placebo, when evaluated as a treatment for mild cognitive impairment and mild dementia in individuals with Alzheimer’s disease.

The drugmaker expects to report mid-stage data from a trial testing dalzanemdor as a treatment for the rare Huntington’s disease later this year.

In July, Sage said it was discontinuing a trial testing a drug it was developing with Biogen to treat a neurological condition called essential tremor. The companies subsequently discontinued their partnership on those trials.

Biogen and Sage also collaborate on a drug called Zurzuvae. They received U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for the drug to treat postpartum depression last year, but the FDA rejected it for clinical depression, a bigger market.

As of June 30, Sage had cash and equivalents of $647 million, which it had said should be sufficient to support operations into 2026.

(Reporting by Manas Mishra and Christy Santhosh in Bengaluru; Editing by Pooja Desai)