A strategic antibody partnership between WuXi Biologics and ABL Bio Corporation has been expanded. This time around the collaboration will focus on bispecific antibody and immune-oncology programme.
Under the terms of the agreements, the South Korean biotechnology company, ABL, has rights to use WuXi's proprietary Immune Check Point Bispecifics discovery platforms, including WuXiBody and CD3 platform. It can use these to research, develop and commercialise multiple bispecific antibodies. It also has the rights to develop new bispecific antibodies targeting novel immune check point receptor.
In return for access to its platforms, WuXi will receive an upfront payment as well as development, regulatory and commercial milestone payments of about US$220 million, and will be entitled to royalties based on global sales of the programmes.
The partnership began in November 2018, when the two companies announced an exclusive development and clinical manufacturing partnership for 8 bispecific antibodies. This announcement today furthers the breadth and depth of the companies’ collaboration.
Dr Sang Hoon Lee, CEO of ABL Bio, said: “I believe that the partnership with WuXi Biologics will bring a synergy for developing our bispecific antibody pipelines. It will help us to develop novel immune-oncology therapies on different bispecific platforms and lead us to step up to be a global top-tier biotechnology company for immuno-oncology and neurodegenerative disease treatment.”
Dr Chris Chen, WuXi Biologics CEO, said that since WuXiBody’s launch last August, it has signed seven partnerships.
“Quick adoption of our WuXiBody bispecific platform further validates that this proprietary platform addresses most technical limitations of current bispecific platforms and can potentially tremendously reduce the cost of making these biologics.”