What are the key takeaways from this The Bio Report episode?

Key insights include: **Allosteric vs. active-site inhibition:** TURN-701 binds the allosteric site on the BCR-ABL fusion protein rather than the active site, producing greater selectivity and avoiding off-target kinase hits. This mechanism eliminates side effects common to first- and second-generation therapies, including arterial occlusive events, pleural effusion in roughly 30% of patients, hypertension, and pancreatitis.; **Efficacy benchmark:** In third-line-plus CML patients, TURN-701 achieved a 75% major molecular response rate at doses under expansion, versus 25% for the current leading therapy in comparable patient populations. Reaching undetectable transcript levels for three to five consecutive years allows some patients to discontinue therapy entirely and remain in remission.; **Tolerability as a commercial differentiator:** TURN-701 can be taken without food restrictions, while competing allosteric and active-site inhibitors require a three-hour fasting window once or twice daily. For patients on lifelong therapy, food-unrestricted dosing directly improves adherence and reduces efficacy loss from non-compliance, making tolerability a primary commercial positioning argument.

What did Annie Burrows discuss on The Bio Report?

Terns Pharmaceuticals CEO Annie Burrows explains how the company pivoted from metabolic disease to chronic myeloid leukemia after its allosteric BCR-ABL inhibitor TURN-701 achieved a 75% major molecular response rate in third-line-plus patients, compared to 25% for the current best-in-class therapy, prompting a $748M capital raise. Key topics include: **Allosteric vs. active-site inhibition:** TURN-701 binds the allosteric site on the BCR-ABL fusion protein rather than the active site, producing greater selectivity and avoiding off-target kinase hits. This mechanism eliminates side effects common to first- and second-generation therapies, including arterial occlusive events, pleural effusion in roughly 30% of patients, hypertension, and pancreatitis.; **Efficacy benchmark:** In third-line-plus CML patients, TURN-701 achieved a 75% major molecular response rate at doses under expansion, versus 25% for the current leading therapy in comparable patient populations. Reaching undetectable transcript levels for three to five consecutive years allows some patients to discontinue therapy entirely and remain in remission..

How long is this episode of The Bio Report?

This episode is 22 minutes long. SignalCast provides an AI-generated summary so you can get the key insights in about 3 minutes.

The Bio Report

A Strategic Turn from Obesity to Cancer

February 18, 2026

22 min episode · 2 min read

Annie Burrows

Episode

22 min

Read time

2 min

Topics

Health & Wellness, Fundraising & VC, Leadership

AI-Generated Summary

Published Mar 14, 2026

Key Takeaways

✓Allosteric vs. active-site inhibition: TURN-701 binds the allosteric site on the BCR-ABL fusion protein rather than the active site, producing greater selectivity and avoiding off-target kinase hits. This mechanism eliminates side effects common to first- and second-generation therapies, including arterial occlusive events, pleural effusion in roughly 30% of patients, hypertension, and pancreatitis.
✓Efficacy benchmark: In third-line-plus CML patients, TURN-701 achieved a 75% major molecular response rate at doses under expansion, versus 25% for the current leading therapy in comparable patient populations. Reaching undetectable transcript levels for three to five consecutive years allows some patients to discontinue therapy entirely and remain in remission.
✓Tolerability as a commercial differentiator: TURN-701 can be taken without food restrictions, while competing allosteric and active-site inhibitors require a three-hour fasting window once or twice daily. For patients on lifelong therapy, food-unrestricted dosing directly improves adherence and reduces efficacy loss from non-compliance, making tolerability a primary commercial positioning argument.
✓Capital allocation discipline: Terns is licensing out its THR-beta asset TURN-501 and GIPRA antagonist TURN-801 series rather than funding parallel development tracks. Concentrating the $748M raise exclusively on TURN-701 provides sufficient runway to complete pivotal trials and self-fund a commercial launch without additional financing, eliminating dilution risk for existing shareholders.
✓Regulatory and development timeline: Terns plans to present two meaningfully differentiated doses to the FDA under Project Optimus requirements, select the optimal dose, and initiate a second-line-plus pivotal trial of approximately 250 patients by late 2026 or early 2027, with a frontline pivotal trial to follow, mirroring the trial size used by the approved allosteric competitor.

What It Covers

Terns Pharmaceuticals CEO Annie Burrows explains how the company pivoted from metabolic disease to chronic myeloid leukemia after its allosteric BCR-ABL inhibitor TURN-701 achieved a 75% major molecular response rate in third-line-plus patients, compared to 25% for the current best-in-class therapy, prompting a $748M capital raise.

Key Questions Answered

•Allosteric vs. active-site inhibition: TURN-701 binds the allosteric site on the BCR-ABL fusion protein rather than the active site, producing greater selectivity and avoiding off-target kinase hits. This mechanism eliminates side effects common to first- and second-generation therapies, including arterial occlusive events, pleural effusion in roughly 30% of patients, hypertension, and pancreatitis.
•Efficacy benchmark: In third-line-plus CML patients, TURN-701 achieved a 75% major molecular response rate at doses under expansion, versus 25% for the current leading therapy in comparable patient populations. Reaching undetectable transcript levels for three to five consecutive years allows some patients to discontinue therapy entirely and remain in remission.
•Tolerability as a commercial differentiator: TURN-701 can be taken without food restrictions, while competing allosteric and active-site inhibitors require a three-hour fasting window once or twice daily. For patients on lifelong therapy, food-unrestricted dosing directly improves adherence and reduces efficacy loss from non-compliance, making tolerability a primary commercial positioning argument.
•Capital allocation discipline: Terns is licensing out its THR-beta asset TURN-501 and GIPRA antagonist TURN-801 series rather than funding parallel development tracks. Concentrating the $748M raise exclusively on TURN-701 provides sufficient runway to complete pivotal trials and self-fund a commercial launch without additional financing, eliminating dilution risk for existing shareholders.
•Regulatory and development timeline: Terns plans to present two meaningfully differentiated doses to the FDA under Project Optimus requirements, select the optimal dose, and initiate a second-line-plus pivotal trial of approximately 250 patients by late 2026 or early 2027, with a frontline pivotal trial to follow, mirroring the trial size used by the approved allosteric competitor.

Notable Moment

Burrows revealed that resistance mutations account for only about 15% of efficacy failures among heavily pretreated CML patients who have cycled through three or more therapies, challenging the common assumption that resistance drives most treatment failures and reframing TURN-701's primary value as upfront potency rather than mutation coverage.

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Episode Transcript

I'm Daniel Levine, and this is the Bio Report. When Annie Burrows stepped in as CEO of Terns Pharmaceuticals, she not only had to fill a void created by the death of her predecessor, but also lead a strategic shift from an increasingly crowded area of metabolic disease to focus on its experimental therapy for chronic myeloid leukemia. The company's allosteric BCR ABL inhibitor binds to a different site on the fusion protein than most first and second generation tyrosine kinase inhibitors. The data have the company and its investors believing the drug can reset the bar for both efficacy and tolerability in a multibillion dollar market. We spoke to Burrows about reinventing the company, the decision to seek partners for noncore assets, and how she's charting a clear path forward toward a broader oncology future. Amy, thanks for joining us. Danny, thanks so much for having me today. It's great to talk to you. We're gonna talk about chronic myeloid leukemia, turns pharmaceuticals, and the changes you've made there since you took the helm in 2024. You joined the company following the loss of the CEO, San Suuram to cancer in 2023, why did you take the position and what was compelling about the opportunity to you? I did not know Sen. It was a tragic loss for the company, for his family and friends. And I really saw a company that had a void of leadership and, had a great group of people and, therapeutics that could really make a difference for people. And I I had not known about it before, frankly, Russell Reynolds called me. And the more I learned about it, the more I met the board, and some of the people and understood the potential of turn seven zero one, and our metabolic assets, the more interested I became. You you made a strategic shift at the company away from its focus on metabolic disease and obesity to focus resources on advancing the company's lead program in chronic myeloid leukemia. What was the thinking there? Well, Danny, I will say I don't wanna take too much credit because we really followed the data. So when I started in February 2024, we were just starting to dose patients in chronic myeloid leukemia with turn seven zero one. So we didn't have any clinical data. We also were at the very early stages of looking at turn six zero one, in humans. And so it really was a follow the data type of story. And as we saw turn six zero one, our first trial looked good. We followed the data and did second trial. And as we saw the turn seven zero one data evolve to be really looking like a best in disease drug and better than anybody could have expected, it was a pretty easy decision to focus there. As we looked also at the landscape in metabolic disease and obesity, the players with large amounts of capital, and a diverse set of …

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