BMS’s new schizophrenia drug has big potential, but won’t be an overnight success

It could be the middle of next year before BMS’s launch of newly approved schizophrenia therapy Cobenfy meaningfully accelerates, after which the pharma’s plan to maximize the product’s blockbuster potential will hinge on data in additional indications.

FDA’s approval on Thursday of first-in-class therapy Cobenfy, formerly KarXT, gives patients a treatment option that works differently than all the antipsychotics that came before it. The product, which  Bristol Myers Squibb Co. (NYSE:BMY) will launch late next month, is a combination of xanomeline and trospium that results in M1/M4 agonism in the CNS. Virtually all other antipsychotic drugs work through effects on dopamine and serotonin receptors...