Roche partners with Ascidian Therapeutics to develop gene therapies
June 18 (Reuters) -Swiss drugmaker Roche ROG.S will team up with privately held biotech Ascidian Therapeutics to develop gene therapies targeting difficult to treat neurological diseases, the Boston-based startup said on Tuesday.
WHY IT'S IMPORTANT
Roche is pursuing several therapeutic fields to offset falling oncology sales, setting a high deal pace to restore its development pipeline that was hit by major trial setbacks in Alzheimer's and cancer immunotherapy in 2022.
Under the agreement, Roche gets exclusive rights to Ascidian's RNA exon editing technology to develop therapies for undisclosed neurological diseases.
BY THE NUMBERS
Ascidian will receive an initial payment of $42 million and up to $1.8 billion in research, clinical, and commercial milestone payments. It is also eligible to receive royalties on commercial sales worldwide for any therapies developed under the partnership.
CONTEXT
Ascidian, backed by venture capital firm Apple Tree Partners, is separately testing a genetic eye disease therapy in an early-stage trial. It raised $40 million in its latest funding round in November 2023.
The therapy candidate, ACDN-01, is also based on its RNA exon editing technology that involves replacing mutated sections of genes with healthy ones.
This approach aims to provide long-lasting effect similar to traditional gene therapy but with reduced risks compared to direct DNA editing and gene replacement.
KEY QUOTES
"Our partnership with Ascidian is an opportunity to harness advanced RNA exon editing technology, which has the potential to deliver transformative one-time therapeutics by editing multiple whole exons at the RNA level with a single treatment," James Sabry, global head of pharma partnering at Roche, said.
Reporting by Pratik Jain in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila
Related Assets
Latest News
Disclaimer: The XM Group entities provide execution-only service and access to our Online Trading Facility, permitting a person to view and/or use the content available on or via the website, is not intended to change or expand on this, nor does it change or expand on this. Such access and use are always subject to: (i) Terms and Conditions; (ii) Risk Warnings; and (iii) Full Disclaimer. Such content is therefore provided as no more than general information. Particularly, please be aware that the contents of our Online Trading Facility are neither a solicitation, nor an offer to enter any transactions on the financial markets. Trading on any financial market involves a significant level of risk to your capital.
All material published on our Online Trading Facility is intended for educational/informational purposes only, and does not contain – nor should it be considered as containing – financial, investment tax or trading advice and recommendations; or a record of our trading prices; or an offer of, or solicitation for, a transaction in any financial instruments; or unsolicited financial promotions to you.
Any third-party content, as well as content prepared by XM, such as: opinions, news, research, analyses, prices and other information or links to third-party sites contained on this website are provided on an “as-is” basis, as general market commentary, and do not constitute investment advice. To the extent that any content is construed as investment research, you must note and accept that the content was not intended to and has not been prepared in accordance with legal requirements designed to promote the independence of investment research and as such, it would be considered as marketing communication under the relevant laws and regulations. Please ensure that you have read and understood our Notification on Non-Independent Investment. Research and Risk Warning concerning the foregoing information, which can be accessed here.
