Jan-Anders Karlsson says the recent strengthening of its management team has given Verona Pharma PLC (LON:VRP) the experience to take its respiratory disease treatment Ensifentrine to market.
The COPD drug is undergoing a phase IIb trial with 400 very severe sufferers who use a nebulizer.
Results are expected around the end of the year and Karlsson, the Aim and Nasdaq-listed group’s chief executive, believes Ensifentrine can make a real difference both to people with severe forms of the disease and earlier-stage sufferers.
“It’s a new mechanism, a new compound and a new mode of action,” he tells Proactive’s Andrew Scott.
“We can help people who have nowhere else to go.”
Talks are already ongoing with possible partners about commercialising the drug, though Karlsson believes Verona can market it on its own in the US.
“It’s elsewhere we will need some help,” he says.