A New Fight Against Female Sexual Dysfunction
There is new news on the fight against sexual dysfunction in women. Noven Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: NOVN) has entered into global license and supply agreements with Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) under the consumer product giant’s Pharmaceuticals unit for the development and commercialization of prescription transdermal patches for the treatment of Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder in women. The condition is called HSDD. You can hear thousands of husbands cheering right now.
Noven has granted P&G an exclusive worldwide license to a testosterone patch for the treatment of HSDD in women, as well as potential next-generation patches in the same therapeutic category.
As part of this arrangement, Noven will receive royalties and manufacturing fees as well as development and sales milestones relating to the licensed products. P&G will also fund any clinical development costs and is also responsible for any regulatory filings and marketing applications associated with the licensed products.
Noven successfully formulated the licensed testosterone patch utilizing its patented DOT Matrix® transdermal delivery technology pursuant to a development agreement between Noven and P&GP established in 2003.
This is just one more product for P&G, but for Noven this might be a windfall. Its market cap is only $310 million and its total revenues for 2007 were listed as $83.161 million. This is supposed to be the crossover profitability year for Noven as well on a non-GAAP basis with analysts looking for estimates of $0.61 EPS on $102.3 million in revenues.
Jon C. Ogg
August 21, 2008