Motley Fool sees $KITE as a juicy buyout Target.

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Flying high
Keith Speights (Kite Pharma): It's been a great year for Kite Pharma so far. The clinical-stage biotech announced great results on Feb. 28 for its lead candidate, axicabtagene ciloleucel. (I suspect the name came from throwing Scrabble tiles on a Kite scientist's desk.)

Lab scientists working together on a project.
IMAGE SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES.

In a phase 2/3 clinical study, the chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) drug produced astonishing results. Patients with chemorefractory aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) who took a single infusion of axicabtagene ciloleucel (let's call it AC for short) experienced an 82% objective response rate. After six months, a full 36% of patients had no signs of cancer.

This was beyond merely good news for Kite. These results were so positive that the biotech is quickly moving forward with pursuing regulatory approval. It also could bode well for AC in treating other types of cancer.

Even with the recent run-up in Kite stock, the biotech still has a relatively low market cap. That makes it readily affordable for a host of larger companies. In my view, Kite is one of the best acquisition targets around right now. I'll be shocked if Kite isn't snatched up by a larger company by the end of the year -- if not much sooner.

Kite is flying high. I expect the stock to go even higher, with the possibility of a bidding war between multiple big biopharmaceutical suitors.

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