Seeking Blockbuster, Genzyme Binds Polymer Developer GelTex

When Genzyme Corp. and GelTex Pharmaceuticals Inc. created a 50-50 joint venture in 1997 to commercialize the smaller company's Renagel, the response was lukewarm [See Deal]. Genzyme was a niche market player with a reputation for only buying products and companies on the cheap. GelTex's drug was aimed at controlling elevated serum phosphorous in patients with end-stage renal disease undergoing dialysis, but Genzyme had no existing program around kidney disease. Analysts therefore correctly surmised that allying with Genzyme meant GelTex had been turned away by more established players in the dialysis area who saw Renagel as nothing more than a somewhat interesting, mid-tier product.

Now, however, clinical data have shown that calcium plays a role in cardiovascular disease among dialysis patients. And because Renagelis...