Isis Keeps Cholesterol Down, Stock Prices Up

With an antisense drug already on the market via its partnership with Novartis (NYSE: NVS), Isis Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: ISIS) continues to show progress with its impressive pipeline of 17 other development-stage drugs.

Today brought more good news for shareholders, as the company announced positive results in the phase 2 clinical trials of ISIS 301012. This drug is an experimental cholesterol-lowering drug, another in the company's pipeline of antisense drugs. Antisense drugs, like RNAi technology, aim to halt a disease by targeting and silencing genes at the root of a condition.

This is an important event for shareholders, not only because of the potential blockbuster that this drug could be if and when it makes it to market, but also because it demonstrates the drugmaker's knack for successfully pushing drugs through requisite clinical trials. Despite an impressive run-up in the price of this stock, it still maintains long-term upside potential.

Isis has been wheeling and dealing with some of the large-cap pharmaceuticals who are buying into its technology. On Tuesday, the company received approval from antitrust regulators to proceed with a collaboration agreement with Johnson & Johnson's (NYSE: JNJ) Ortho McNeil unit in a quest to develop two diabetes drugs. In recent months the company has also formed a microRNA partnership with Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (NYSE: ALNY) and a cardiovascular-disease collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb (NYSE: BMY). I think these partnerships really go to show that the company's technology sells itself, and that Isis will continue to be a stock to watch.

For related Foolishness check out:

• Bristol-Myers Buys In to Biologics
• Novartis on the Biosimilar Attack