MannKind is a biopharmaceutical company that actualizes therapeutics for the treatment of diabetes and cancer, and has also developed a novel inhalation-based drug delivery system that enables enhanced drug efficacy. The company’s diabetes therapeutics include a rapid acting mealtime insulin as well as a glucagons-like peptide therapeutic, both of which regulate blood glucose by decreasing and increasing levels, respectively. Both diabetes medications are administered by inhalation using the company’s proprietary drug delivery system, which has been shown to vastly increase the drugs performance by avoiding the degradation of the medications that occurs when they are administered orally. The company’s oncology platform has developed an immunotherapy based treatment for cancer. In a two-step process, the patient’s immune system is first primed with cancer specific genetic material that sensitizes the immune system against the cancer itself. Next, the patient is treated with the cancer components that the immune system is now sensitive to, leading to an immune system attack against the patient’s cancer, without the attacking of healthy tissue. The company’s diabetes drugs are currently in Phase III clinical trials, and the company’s cancer treatment is currently in Phase I clinical trials.
