US-based biotech firms Editas Medicine and Genevant Sciences have teamed up to develop in-vivogene editing medicines directed to two undisclosed targets in Editas’ upregulation strategy.
Editas develops rare disease therapeutics using its CRISPR gene editing technology and Genevant RNA-based therapeutics using its lipid nanoparticle (LNP) delivery technology.
The two have signed a collaboration and licence agreement to develop new medicines using Editas’s CRISPR Cas12a genome editing systems and Genevant’s LNP technology.
Under the terms of the deal, Genevant will grant Editas a global licence to certain Genevant LNP technologies to produce mRNA-CRISPR Cas12a-LNP products,
In exchange, Genevant will receive up to $238m in upfront and contingent milestone payments, along with tiered royalties on future product sales.
Editas Medicine chief scientific officer Linda Burkly said: “Editas has made significant strides to achieve our vision of becoming a leader in in-vivo programmable gene editing medicine, and we are making strong progress towards the clinic as we develop our pipeline of future medicines.
“As we investigated the delivery landscape to identify systems for our in vivo upregulation strategy that would best complement our gene editing technology, we quickly identified Genevant, an established leader in the LNP space, and we are delighted to launch this collaboration.”
Editas is a clinical-stage gene editing company, focused on leveraging the CRISPR/Cas12a and CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing systems to develop treatments for serious diseases.
It is engaged in discovering, developing, manufacturing, and commercialising advanced, durable, precision genomic medicines for a wide range of diseases.
The company is the exclusive licensee of Broad Institute’s Cas12a patent estate and Broad Institute and Harvard University’s Cas9 patent estates for human medicines.
Earlier this year, Editas and Bristol Myers Squibb extended their autologous and allogeneic alpha-beta T cell therapies collaboration for two years.
Genevant is a nucleic acid delivery company with an extensive lipid nanoparticle (LNP) patent portfolio, and decades of experience in nucleic acid drug delivery and development.
Its scientists have mastered the LNP delivery of nucleic acids for more than two decades, and its LNP platform has been studied across more than a dozen discrete product candidates.
Genevant Sciences chief scientific officer James Heyes said: “We are thrilled to be working with Editas, a gene editing pioneer, to develop potentially transformative gene editing treatments.
“LNPs have emerged as a preferred approach for delivering gene editing constructs, and we are excited by the promise of combining our industry-leading LNP technology with Editas’s innovation in this burgeoning field.”
