c: MAP Pharmaceuticals Inc. Announces Deal with AstraZeneca, $800 Million + Potential

Looking at the wide variety of companies working to make a go of their businesses makes one wonder when and if any of them actually make the leap from development stage company to profitable. So many companies operate in the negative and on credit through the year, with only a hope of breaking through. Every once in a while, however, a company makes the leap after laying out millions to get their product to market. Jumping on the bandwagon at the right time is the way to profit, especially when most investors have been hiding in cash for so long. Risk is still there, but then again how low can things go at this point. Pharma has the cash and may be one of the few places to look for a more “stable” play.

MAP Pharmaceuticals Inc., a development stage drug company, works to develop pharmaceutical type medications primarily directed at pediatric asthma, non-pediatric asthma, migraines and diabetes. The company is more specifically involved in the medications and cardiac inhaler delivery systems involved with the delivery of these medications.

To imply that the company is more oriented toward the delivery system of the medications it develops would be misleading. It is the company’s work with inhalable drug particles, to enable inhalable cardiac delivery, that drive value in the company. It currently has four products in later stage Phase I-III development involving this type of medication and delivery system. Its lead pediatric asthma product, Unit Dose Budesonide, is in the midst of Phase III trials. Announced today, the company will be working globally with AstraZeneca to market and develop the product. From all indications regarding the agreement, the company may be able to eliminate the “development stage” description it currently uses to describe its status. Limited details indicate a $40 million initial cash payment, another $35 million at health acceptance and another potential $825 million + in payments if sales and marketing work as planned. From a separate and speculative forward looking point of view, success of this particular product would also bode fairly well for the other pipeline products that the company has in trials.

As mentioned in past posts, “Big Pharma” has quite a large pile of cash waiting to be used and a short pipeline of products and patent restrictions. It needs to begin looking further into the future to keep its revenue stream flowing. Finding smaller development stage companies is one such way to accomplish this task. Apparently, MAP Pharmaceuticals is one of those companies. Others are working to get their products along the food chain with pipelines churning. But until then, MAP is enjoying a nice holiday season and a solid coming year if and when its Unit Dose product finds approval.