F-star Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company dedicated to developing immunotherapies to transform the lives of patients with cancer, has entered into a license and collaboration agreement with Janssen Biotech. The agreement was facilitated by Johnson & Johnson Innovation.
Under the agreement, F-star will grant Janssen a worldwide, exclusive royalty-bearing license to research, develop, and commercialise up to five novel bispecific antibodies directed to Janssen therapeutic targets using F-star’s proprietary Fcab and mAb2 platforms. Janssen will be responsible for all research, development, and commercialisation activities.
Neil Brewis, PhD, CSO of F-star said, “We are pleased to collaborate with Janssen and leverage the science of F-star’s proprietary tetravalent bispecific technology. Beyond our proprietary pipeline, we believe there is broad potential for our mAb2 platform to produce multiple next-generation bispecific antibody therapeutics.”
F-star is entitled to receive upfront fees of $17.5m, near-term fees and potential further milestones of up to $1.35bn. The company is also eligible to receive potential tiered mid-single digit royalties on annual net sales.