Chiome Bioscience and Chugai Pharmaceutical sign research agreement

Chiome and Chugai will develop novel value-added therapeutic monoclonal antibodies employing Chiome’s autonomously diversifying library (ADLib) system and will apply the system to assessment of target proteins and lead generation of products for clinical use. Chugai will pay a contractual up-front fee to Chiome and will also pay milestones based on the results of the research. Other contractual conditions were not disclosed.

Chiome and Chugai have previously established a research collaboration agreement. This new agreement expands the number of the targets to be addressed and extends the term of the collaboration.

Through this collaboration Chiome and Chugai Pharmaceutical will shorten research lead-times and improve the quality and speed of development of antibody therapeutics by maximizing the synergy between the ADLib system and the capabilities of Chugai’s therapeutic antibody R&D team.

Masaaki Fujiwara, president and CEO of Chiome, said: I am extremely happy that Chugai Pharmaceuticals’s assessment of the ADLib system was positive and that this larger multi-year, multi-target joint research agreement has been concluded. Our technology should be able to address recalcitrant antigens for which no specific antibodies have been obtained before.

We will also generate innovative antibodies by employing in the collaboration for the first time a novel method for cell-surface presentation of antigens in their native conformations.