Revitope Oncology Inc. and Junshi Biosciences announced the companies have entered into a strategic research collaboration. Revitope will leverage its proprietary protein engineering platform together with Junshi’s novel antibody components to develop first-in-class dual-antigen targeting cancer therapies. Revitope is granting Junshi a world-wide exclusive license on products arising from the research collaboration and will receive up to $160 million in development and commercialization milestone payments for each T Cell Engaging Antibody Circuit (TEAC) molecule selected by Junshi, plus tiered royalties. Junshi also commits to making a direct equity investment in Revitope Oncology in the amount of $10M for 9.99% of total Revitope Oncology shares on an as-converted basis with terms and conditions to be mutually agreed and subject to compliance with all applicable laws.
“By leveraging Revitope’s unique two component T-cell immunotherapy platform and our in-house antibody capabilities reaching from discovery to commercialization, dual targeting precision-based novel cancer immunotherapies can be brought into clinical trials in the near future,” commented Dr. Sheng YAO, Vice President of Junshi Biosciences. “As an innovation-driven company, we believe the collaboration with Revitope will empower us to generate a new generation of first-in-class immunotherapy compounds designed to improve both safety and clinical efficacy.”
Revitope’s proprietary T Cell Engaging Antibody Circuit (TEAC) technology platform exploits co-expressed tumor antigens to enable the development of highly specific cancer drugs with improved safety and efficacy over conventional immunotherapeutic approaches. Revitope’s unique approach is based on a pair of tumor-targeted antibodies with a shared T-cell engaging domain which act as inactive pro-drugs unless they encounter cancer cells co-expressing both antigens.
“We are excited to partner with Junshi , a company with state-of-the-art antibody discovery technologies and world-class development capabilities, to advance our unique two-component T-cell engager therapies that have the ability to target tumor cells and deliver more efficacious and safer drugs to patients,” said Steve Arkinstall, PhD, CEO, Revitope Oncology.
Under the terms of the Collaboration and License Agreement, Junshi and Revitope will identify development candidate TEAC pairs against agreed upon targets. Revitope will leverage its TEAC protein engineering platform to develop up to five novel TEAC pairs using proprietary sequences from Junshi’s antibodies with best-in-class pharmacological and therapeutic activity. Junshi will receive a world-wide license to the TEAC pairs and will have sole responsibility for IND enabling studies as well as clinical development, manufacturing and commercialization. Revitope will receive up to $160M in clinical development and commercialization milestone payments for each TEAC molecule selected, plus tiered royalties on net sales.