By Puyaan Singh and Bhanvi Satija (Reuters) -AbbVie shares fell over 12% on Monday after an experimental schizophrenia drug the company acquired last year failed two mid-stage studies, widening rival Bristol Myers Squibb's lead in the market for new treatments for the condition.

AbbVie said a recently acquired drug candidate for schizophrenia missed the key goal in mid-stage studies, pushing its stock sharply lower. Phase 2 studies for emraclidine failed to show a statistically significant improvement in symptoms after six weeks,

Shares in AbbVie slumped Monday after the company disclosed its psychiatric medicine emraclidine didn’t best placebo in two Phase 2 trials.

AbbVie said on Monday its experimental schizophrenia drug failed to meet the main goal of two mid-stage trials, sending its shares down more than 11% in premarket trading.The drug, emraclidine, failed to show a statistically significant improvement on a widely used scale for measuring symptom severity of schizophrenia.

AbbVie stock drops after emraclidine fails Phase 2 trials for schizophrenia, raising questions about its neuroscience strategy and boosting competition for Cobenfy.

AbbVie Inc.’s disappointing trial results for its new schizophrenia drug bode well for rival Bristol Myers Squibb Co., analysts said. On Monday AbbVie ABBV said that its Phase 2 trial investigating emraclidine as a once-daily oral monotherapy treatment for adults with schizophrenia did not meet the primary endpoint of showing a “statistically significant” improvement when compared with a placebo group.

AbbVie’s ABBV mid-stage studies of emraclidine for schizophrenia failed to meet their primary endpoint. Shares of the company lost 12.6% on Monday in response to the disappointing news. However, Bristol Myers’ BMY stock was up 10.

Leerink Partners upgraded Bristol-Myers Squibb (NYSE:BMY) to Outperform from Market Perform on Tuesday, boosting sales projections for the company’s new schizophrenia therapy Cobenfy following a trial setback to a potentially competing product from AbbVie (ABBV).