Medivation Gets Partner for Prostate Drug

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (TheStreet) -- Medivation(MDVN Quote) CEO David Hung has delivered another drug partnership, this time for the company's prostate cancer drug MDV-3100.

Japanese drug maker Astellas said Tuesday that it will pay an upfront fee of $110 million in cash to Medivation in exchange for worldwide marketing rights to MDV-3100, which recently began a pivotal phase III study.

Medivation is also eligible to receive from Astellas another $335 million in cash milestone payments tied to MDV-3100 meeting future development and regulatory goals, plus an added $320 million in commercial milestone payments.

Astellas and Medivation will jointly market MDV-3100 in the U.S. and share costs and profits equally. Astellas will sell the drug outside the U.S. and pay Medivation a double-digit royalty based on sales.

A phase III study of MDV-3100 enrolled its first prostate cancer patient on Sept. 23. The study compares MDV-3100 againt a placebo in 1,200 patients with advanced prostate cancer who have already received first-line treatment with the chemotherapy drug Taxotere. The primary goal of the study is to demonstrate that MDV-3100 can prolong survival in these patients.

In September 2008, Medivation's Hung negotiated one of the biggest partnership deals of that year when Pfizer(PFE Quote) bought worldwide commercial rights to Dimebon, Medivation's Alzheimer's drug.

More recently, Johnson & Johnson(JNJ Quote) paid roughly $900 million in May to acquire Cougar Biotechnology, which is developing a prostate cancer drug very similar to Medivation's MDV-3100.

Medivation shares closed Monday at $26.10.

-- Reported by Adam Feuerstein in Boston