ADRIA's FIRST ANTICANCER DRUG FROM DAVID BULL OF AUSTRALIA
Executive Summary
ADRIA's FIRST ANTICANCER DRUG FROM DAVID BULL OF AUSTRALIA will be available to the U.S. market before the end of the year, Adria predicted in a recent press release announcing a licensing agreement with the Australian firm. Noting that it has "entered into a partnership with David Bull Laboratories Pty. Ltd. to market a number of cancer chemotherapy products in North America," Adria declared: "The agreement currently calls for supply of five generic products, the first of which will be available by late 1986." Adria said that "the products will be marketed in innovative pharmaceutical preparations, including preservative-free solutions, sterile freeze-dried products, and ready-to-use solutions." Adria President David Robinson commented that "Adria chose David Bull Laboratories as its partner because of David Bull's reputation for quality and innovation in delivery systems for these products." By extending its anticancer product line through the agreement with David Bull, Adria said it is hoping to position itself as a sole vendor of antineoplastic drugs to hospitals. The firm said that its goal is to become "the broadest-based supplier of antineoplastic products in the U.S." Adria's Robinson added that "a key benefit to the medical community will be that, for the first time, hospitals will have access to a large supply of generic anticancer products from a single source, thereby eliminating unnecessary time spent ordering from several companies." Adria currently markets Adriamycin (doxorubicin HCl) as well as generic versions of cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, vincristine and 5-fluorouracil." The release notes that the agreement with Bull also "gives Adria the option to market additional products manufactured by David Bull outside of the oncology line in the U.S." David Bull, according to the Adria press release, is "the largest Australian producer of small-volume parenteral products." The firm is owned by the Australian drug manufacturer and wholesaler F.H. Faulding & Co. Ltd.