Under the deal, Nurix will receive an upfront payment of $60m along with the potential to get research, development, regulatory, and commercial milestone payments totalling up to $3.4bn across various programmes
Nurix and Seagen to develop Degrader-Antibody Conjugates for cancer. (Credit: Trnava University on Unsplash)
Biopharmaceutical company Nurix Therapeutics has signed a multi-year, multi-target strategic collaboration agreement with US-based Seagen to develop a new class of medicines, Degrader-Antibody Conjugates (DACs), for use in cancer.
According to the terms of the contract, Nurix will receive an upfront payment of $60m.
The biopharmaceutical firm will also have the potential to get research, development, regulatory, and commercial milestone payments totalling up to $3.4bn across various programmes.
Additionally, Nurix will be qualified for mid-single to low double-digit tiered royalties on future sales, and the company still has the option to participate in US profit sharing and co-promote two joint products.
As part of the multi-year partnership, the biopharmaceutical company will use its DELigase platform to create a collection of targeted protein degraders. It will be used against various targets suggested by Seagen that are suitable for antibody conjugation.
Seagen will combine these degraders with antibodies to develop these DACs. The American biotechnology company will also advance these DAC therapeutic candidates through preclinical, clinical, and commercial development.
This partnership has the potential to result in the development and commercialisation of various DAC drugs due to the potential of conjugating multiple antibodies to various degraders.
Nurix president and CEO Arthur Sands said: “By combining the tissue and tumour specificity of antibodies with highly potent and catalytic targeted degradation of cancer driver proteins, we believe that DACs may represent a next generation of cancer medicine for a wide range of solid tumours and hematologic malignancies.
“With Seagen, our strategic goal is to advance ADC technology to the next level to provide patients with new DAC drugs that deliver greater anti-tumour efficacy and safety compared to currently available agents.”
With this upfront payment of $60m, Nurix anticipates that its current cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities will be enough to cover its operating expenses through the second quarter of 2025.