Ventus Therapeutics, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company utilizing structural biology and a proprietary computational chemistry platform to identify and develop small molecule therapeutics across a broad range of diseases, announced that the company has entered into an exclusive worldwide license agreement with Novo Nordisk A/S to develop and commercialize candidates from Ventus’ portfolio of peripherally-restricted NLRP3 inhibitors.
“This is an important collaboration for Ventus that validates our structural biology capabilities to discover and develop highly differentiated molecules with novel chemical structures,” said Marcelo Bigal, M.D., Ph.D., President and CEO of Ventus. “We believe Novo Nordisk is the ideal partner to advance our lead NLRP3 program in a broad range of systemic disease areas in which they have deep expertise, such as cardiometabolic diseases.”
Under the terms of the agreement, Novo Nordisk will make an upfront payment of $70 million in cash to Ventus and provide research and development funding. In addition, Ventus will be eligible to receive up to an additional $633 million in potential clinical, regulatory, and commercial milestones as well as tiered royalties.
In exchange, Novo Nordisk will receive exclusive worldwide rights to develop and commercialize Ventus’ lead NLRP3 inhibitor program for a broad range of diseases, including nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), chronic kidney disease, and other cardiometabolic conditions.
Ventus retains the right to develop NLRP3 inhibitors for certain systemic diseases, including specific inflammatory and respiratory diseases. In addition, Ventus retains worldwide rights to the company’s distinct brain-penetrant NLRP3 inhibitor program.
“NLRP3 is a biologically relevant target with significant potential across a number of liver, kidney, and cardiometabolic diseases,” said Karin Conde-Knape, Senior Vice President of Global Drug Discovery at Novo Nordisk. “Ventus has developed a highly differentiated NLRP3 inhibitor program with best-in-class properties and compelling pre-clinical results. We are excited to partner with Ventus to advance this program to provide meaningful clinical benefit to patients within a broad range of diseases.”