AstraZeneca, MAP End Asthma Alliance

AstraZeneca has terminated its license agreement with MAP Pharmaceuticals, Inc. related to the company’s Unit Dose Budesonide (UDB) product candidate. All rights to the drug revert to MAP, who plans to suspend development of UDB, which did not meet primary endpoints in a Phase III trial in children 12-months to eight years of age with mild asthma.

“Physicians and parents continue to express a need for improved therapies for pediatric asthma that offer faster nebulization times, lower doses of steroid exposure, improved treatment compliance and reduced side effects when compared to currently available therapies. MAP Pharmaceuticals is considering options for its pediatric asthma program moving forward, including the development of a next generation therapy with budesonide,” said Timothy S. Nelson, president and chief executive officer of MAP Pharmaceuticals.