SK Biopharmaceutical launches Xcopri in US

SK Biopharmaceutical is tapping the 4 trillion won ($3.2 billion) US antiepileptic drug market with Xcopri, the company said Tuesday.

Xcopri, the company’s brand of cenobamate tablets, is the product of SK Biopharmaceutical CEO Cho Jeong-woo‘s 15-year research and development drive.

The drug is an alternative treatment for adults with partial-onset seizures.

“Patients can have different responses to the various seizure medicines that are available. (Xcopri) provides an additional needed treatment option for people with this condition,” Billy Dunn, the director of the Office of Neuroscience in the US Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, had said in November 2019 when Xcopri gained the FDA approval.

The distribution in the US is undertaken by SK Biopharmaceutical’s US arm, SK Life Science.

SK Biopharmaceutical cited Frost & Sullivan in saying that the global antiepileptic treatment market roughly amounted to $6.1 billion in 2018, of which 54 percent is accredited to the US.

The US market is believed to grow from $3.3 billion in 2018 to approximately $4.1 billion in 2024, SK Biopharmaceutical said.

“There lies a significance in Xcopri being the first Korean novel drug entirely researched and developed independently by a Korean pharma firm,” said SK Biopharmaceutical CEO Cho. “And that we are directly distributing the drug in the US market.”

Sebby Borriello, the chief commercial officer of SK Life Science, said that he would carefully navigate through the shifted medical terrain in the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic in marketing Xcorpi.

By Lim Jeong-yeo (kaylalim@heraldcorp.com)