Big Pharma’s Next Big Buyout: From Tiny Company to the Next Lung Cancer Treatment King – Virtually Overnight

Cancer is one of the most challenging illnesses in medicine to solve. That’s because it’s not caused by a virus or bacteria but the body’s own cells malfunctioning. All cancer really originates as a cell that refuses to die.

All 36 trillion cells (for men) or 28 trillion cells (for women) in your body have their own life spans. They’re created, serve their purpose, and then die. Every seven years or so, all of your body’s cells have replaced themselves.

But doing all that cell reproduction perfectly across tens of trillions of cells is virtually impossible…

Our cells mutate from exposure to the environment, diseases, food, water, everything. As we age, we pick up more of those mutations. Our immune system destroys tons of those abnormal, potentially precancerous cells every day. But because they are our own cells, some of them slip past the immune system.

They grow bigger and bigger and replicate the mutation that prevents them from dying, and that creates a cancerous tumor. But it’s still part of your body. For the most part, it has the same DNA as the normal cells around it that it’s damaging.

Because of that, our immune systems struggle to deal with tumors. The immune system is primarily meant to destroy foreign invaders, not damage the cells of the body they’re a part of.

Traditional treatments for cancer can do even more harm than good.

Chemotherapy involves flooding chemicals into the body to kill cancer cells. But those chemicals don’t discriminate and kill a lot of healthy cells as well.

Radiotherapy involves using radiation to kill cancer cells. Radiation destroys cells totally. But it can also irradiate and cause mutations in cells in the proximity.

Sometimes, those treatments can kill a patient before the cancer does. Modern immunotherapy is focused on getting the immune system to attack cancer itself, but it can be difficult to do that, and it doesn’t work on every patient.

In simple terms, the bottom line is this: The immune system could use some reinforcements to deal with cancer. Luckily, there’s one company that’s working to hand our bodies some serious firepower in the fight against cancer…

Breathing Easy

It’s called Summit Therapeutics (Nasdaq: SMMT). Its new treatment Ivonescimab is the most advanced synthetic antibody of its type and has received FDA Fast Track designation for lung cancer, one of the most common types of cancer.

Summit’s drug is not the first treatment for lung cancer to take off – that’s Merck’s Keytruda. But Ivonescimab is a significant improvement. Both drugs slow the progression of lung cancer by aiding the immune system in fighting it. However, patients taking Ivonescimab are 49% less likely to get worse than those on Keytruda.

That’s because Ivonescimab combines two different biological mechanisms in a single antibody, PD-1 and VEGF.

The antibody finds the T-cells attacking the cancer and binds to them with the Anti-PD-1 linkers. Meanwhile, the Anti-VEGF links bind onto free-floating elements called VEGF Dimers. That allows multiples of these antibodies to bind onto a single T-cell, which gives the cell a serious shot in the arm.

A T-cell boosted with Ivonescimab is more effective at killing a cancer cell. And the antibody then has the added effect of smothering the blood vessels formed to feed the cancer cells, which makes anything that survives the T-cell onslaught wither and die on the vine.

Right now, Ivonescimab is in three Phase 3 clinical trials for use as a lung cancer treatment. The results from Summit’s previous Phase 3 trials are why I’m so certain that both this company and Ivonescimab have serious potential to save lives and make money doing it…

Primed for Launch

Last year, Ivonescimab made serious progress toward both gaining FDA approval and dominating the lung cancer treatment market.

In May and September 2024, Ivonescimab completed two Phase 3 clinical trials, which saw it double the progression-free survival rate of Keytruda. Ivonescimab’s PFS rate was 11.14 months versus 5.82 months for Keytruda.

Then, in October 2024, Ivonescimab received Fast Track designation from the FDA, which means full approval could come sooner rather than later.

Even better, the company has locked down distribution rights for the drug in the U.S., Europe, Latin America, and Japan.

The result was Summit’s share price skyrocketing 583.7% in 2024. But that was just a primer for the real moonshot to come if or when Ivonescimab receives FDA approval.

Summit’s 2024 bull run caught the attention of many big players on Wall Street who are now pouring money into the company. Billionaire Ken Griffin, one of the most successful investors in history, has taken a massive position of 187,000 shares, worth $3.88 million.

He’s not alone, though. T. Rowe Price has recently purchased 1.1 million shares, State Street bought 2.1 million, and Millennium Management bought 827,500.

I believe this company is very likely to be bought out by one of the big players in the pharmaceutical space. When that happens, the $20 share price is going to shoot through the roof.

Ivonescimab is an incredible drug created by an incredible company. It meets all of my five microcap criteria.

First, this drug is proving incredibly effective at getting the immune system to fight cancers on its own and its early clinical results are showing it’s potentially twice as good as the industry leader. Check.

Second, the company is led by two co-CEOs, Bob Duggan and Dr. Maky Zanganeh. Both of them have previously held positions at Computer Motion, a robotic surgery company that merged with Intuitive Surgical. Duggan then served on the board of directors of Intuitive Surgical. Both Duggan and Zanganeh are also alums of Pharmacyclics, which licensed its blood cancer treatment ibrutinib to Johnson & Johnson before being acquired by AbbVie. That’s visionary leadership checked off. This is neither CEO’s first rodeo.

Third, the company has patent protection for Ivonescimab out until 2039 in the U.S., Europe, and Japan. That’s No. 3 taken care of.

Fourth, Summit is on track for hundreds of millions or billions in future revenue. Keytruda, Ivonescimab’s main competition if it gets FDA approval, saw sales grow 18% to $29.5 billion in 2024. Early data suggests Ivonescimab is a significant improvement over Keytruda, so I can see it easily hoovering up a good chunk of that market for Summit. Criterion No. 4, check.

Fifth, there’s a clear catalyst on the horizon. As is the case for many biotechs with a novel drug, the big catalyst is FDA approval, with smaller catalysts of clinical data being released in the meantime. There’s no shortage of opportunities for Summit to take off…

But the moonshot will come with FDA approval and a likely buyout. And you’ll want to get in now before either of those happen…

Action to Take: Buy Summit Therapeutics Inc. (Nasdaq: SMMT) at market.