The Oncology Trial Bubble: Are We Funding False Hope?
By Jenna Levenson, PhD, RN, MS
A provocative look into the bloated oncology clinical trial landscape. Is the industry prioritizing profit over progress—and what does that mean for investors, CROs, and patients?
The Oncology Trial Bubble: Are We Funding False Hope?
The oncology clinical trial landscape has become the biotech equivalent of the dot-com bubble—flush with capital, flooded with promise, and teetering on the edge of diminishing returns.
We’re launching thousands of oncology trials annually. In 2024 alone, over 30% of all drug development pipelines had an oncology focus. But here's the reality no one wants to say out loud: we are over-indexing on cancer trials with marginal differentiation and underwhelming endpoints—and we're doing it at the expense of innovation in other desperately needed areas.
VCs and investors are backing “me-too” checkpoint inhibitors because the market feels safe—not because the science is groundbreaking.
CROs are scaling teams and sites to accommodate oncology trial volume, while ignoring burnout, slow enrollment, and astronomical screen failure rates.
Principal investigators are trapped in a cycle of trial repetition, running protocol clones with slightly modified biomarkers just to keep funding alive.
Patients are being asked to sacrifice their time, hope, and sometimes lives for trials that might add 2.3 months of PFS… if that.
Let’s ask the uncomfortable question:
Are we chasing breakthroughs—or business models?
“The truth is, the oncology gold rush is less about curing cancer and more about capital cycling. And until that changes, we’ll keep treating the pipeline like a slot machine.”
Here is what we need to do instead:
Prioritize trial design that favors quality over quantity. Stop duplicating trials that already failed in Phase 2 just to reposition a compound.
Incentivize CROs and sponsors to innovate on trial logistics, endpoints, and enrollment strategies. Let’s stop throwing money at recruitment vendors and start overhauling the model.
Fund underrepresented indications. Cancer is not the only disease devastating lives. Non-oncology trials deserve a bigger piece of the pie.
Engage patient advocacy groups early. Oncology trials that ignore real-world logistics, side effects, or QOL tradeoffs are destined to fail ethically, if not statistically.
Investors: This is your call to stop chasing crowded indications and start demanding smarter trials.
CROs: Build smarter infrastructure, not just larger sales teams.
Researchers: Say no to uninspired protocols.
Biotech Founders: Your data is your currency—don't waste it on an unoriginal pitch.
Want real innovation in oncology? Let’s Talk. It starts with saying the quiet part out loud.