Eli Lilly's $8 Billion Oncology Bet Gets Its Chance to Succeed

In early 2019, Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY) made an $8 billion bet on the future of cancer treatment with an $8 billion buyout offer for Loxo Oncology and its pipeline of targeted cancer therapies. On Friday, the jewel at the center of the acquisition, LOXO-292, earned approval from the FDA to hammer away at aggressive tumors driven by RET mutations.

Under the brand name Retevmo, Lilly's RET inhibitor is approved in the U.S. to treat very specific groups of patients with tumors originating in their lungs and thyroid glands. Retevmo's an easy-to-swallow capsule designed to stop mutated RET kinases from driving tumor growth, a condition that describes a low double-digit percentage of thyroid cancers.

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Source Fool.com