Biopharma enters into research collaboration and licence agreement with biotech

Clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, Immatics Biotechnologies, has entered into a research collaboration and licence agreement with international biotech company, Genmab, to develop next generation bispecific cancer immunotherapies.

As per the licence agreement the companies will conduct joint research, which will be funded by Genmab, to combine Immatics’ XPRESIDENT and Bispecific TCR technology platforms with Genmab’s proprietary antibody technologies. This combined offering will then be used to develop multiple bispecific immunotherapies in oncology exclusively directed against three proprietary targets that were discovered and developed with the XPRESIDENT technology.

There is an additional option for Genmab to license two further targets, exclusively, in order to expand the partnership at predetermined economics.

“We are very pleased to join forces with one of the world-leading biotechnology companies to develop and advance novel and highly active cancer therapeutics. This collaboration underpins Immatics’ leadership in intracellular tumour target identification and T-cell receptor engineering,” said Dr Carsten Reinhardt, PhD, chief medical officer and managing director of Immatics. “Our bispecific TCR technology exhibits exceptional potency and favourable pharmacokinetic properties by combining Immatics’ proprietary T-cell engaging format with our high-affinity and highly specific T-cell receptors as reported at AACR 2018.”

“This collaboration with Immatics gives us the opportunity to combine our unique technologies and expertise to create differentiated novel next-generation therapies. We very much look forward to this exciting partnership in the field of cancer immunotherapy,” added Jan van de Winkel, PhD, chief executive officer of Genmab.

Under the terms of the agreement, Immatics will receive an upfront fee of $54 million and is eligible to receive up to $550 million in development, regulatory and commercial milestone payments for each product and tiered royalties up to a double-digit percentage of net sales. Genmab will be responsible for development, manufacturing and worldwide commercialisation. Immatics will have an option to contribute certain promotion efforts at predetermined levels in selected countries in the EU.