Lodo Therapeutics and Genentech sign multi-target agreement

A multi-target strategic collaboration has been formed between drug discovery and development company, Lodo Therapeutics, and Genentech — a member of the Roche Group.

The agreement will see Genentech use Lodo Therapeutics’ proprietary genome mining and biosynthetic cluster assembly platform to identify novel molecules with therapeutic potential against multiple disease-related targets of interest to Genentech.

An undisclosed upfront payment will be made to Lodo Therapeutics as part of this agreement and the company will also be eligible for research, development and commercialisation milestone payments worth up to $969 million, which will be based on achievement of certain predetermined milestones. Furthermore, Lodo will be eligible to receive tiered-royalties on sales of certain products resulting from the collaboration.

“Lodo Therapeutics’ proprietary drug discovery platform is a powerful engine for identifying novel compounds with important therapeutic potential,” saidThong Q. Le, chief executive officer at Lodo Therapeutics and Accelerator Life Science Partners. “We are incredibly excited to work with Genentech, and we look forward to demonstrating the power and utility of Lodo’s unique technology for the benefit of global human health.”

“Our ability to enter into a strategic collaboration with one of the leaders in innovating wholly new classes of drugs just two years after Lodo Therapeutics was founded reflects the potential of our proprietary platform to be a valuable resource to advance their drug discovery initiatives,”revealedDavid Pompliano, PhD, co-founder and chief scientific officer of Lodo Therapeutics.

“We are excited to work with Genentech in their quest to discover novel, next-generation natural products derived from the microbiome of the soil using this innovative platform developed by Lodo,” statedSean Brady, PhD, co-founder of Lodo Therapeutics and associate professor at The Rockefeller University.

Dr James Sabry, PhD, senior vice president and global head of Genentech Partnering, commented: “Genentech is committed to accessing innovative technologies and we are excited to collaborate with Lodo Therapeutics to apply their Metagenomics Technology Platform to potentially discover therapeutics for difficult drug targets.”