The lupus drug, epratuzumab, developed by UCB stumbled in the third and final test phase. Patients who were administered the agent in combination with the standard therapy, did not react significantly better than patients in whom standard therapy was supplemented with a placebo.

Lupus is an autoimmune disease, which leads to inflammatory reactions in the skin. The biopharmaceutical company has invested in epratuzumab for almost a decade, demonstrating the efforts UCB takes to combat the disease and push innovation forward.

Late stage trials are not fail-proof; success is estimated around 50% and show the importance of a broad R&D portfolio. UCB announced that it continues to search for better treatment of lupus and says that another compound is already in development. 3 other flagship drugs from UCB performed very well.