Description of Business

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2016

Organization Consolidation And Presentation Of Financial Statements [Abstract]

Description of Business

NOTE 1. DESCRIPTION OF BUSINESS

Medivation, Inc. (the “Company” or “Medivation”) is a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of medically innovative therapies to treat serious diseases for which there are limited treatment options. It has one commercial product, XTANDI® (enzalutamide) capsules, or XTANDI, through the Company’s collaboration with Astellas Pharma, Inc., or Astellas. XTANDI has received marketing approval in the United States, Europe and numerous other countries worldwide for the treatment of patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer, or mCRPC, and in Japan for the treatment of patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer, or CRPC. The Company and Astellas are also conducting investigational studies of enzalutamide in prostate cancer, advanced breast cancer, and hepatocellular carcinoma. Under the Company’s collaboration agreement with Astellas, it shares equally with Astellas all profits (losses) related to U.S. net sales of XTANDI. The Company also receives royalties ranging from the low teens to the low twenties as a percentage of ex-U.S. XTANDI net sales.

The Company seeks to become a more fully-integrated biopharmaceutical company through the continued commercialization of XTANDI, the acquisition or in-license and development and commercialization of other product opportunities, and through the advancement of its own proprietary research and development programs. The Company expects that its future growth may come from both its internal research efforts, focused in oncology, neurology and other areas, and third-party business development activities, such as its acquisition of all worldwide rights to talazoparib (which is referred to as MDV3800) from BioMarin Pharmaceutical Inc., or BioMarin, in the fourth quarter of 2015 and its license of exclusive worldwide rights to pidilizumab (which is referred to as MDV9300) from CureTech, Ltd., or CureTech, in the fourth quarter of 2014.