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news.Wyeth Pharmaceuticals has entered into an agreement to co-develop and commercialize Trubion Pharmaceuticals' products to treat inflammatory disease and cancer. Under the terms of the deal Trubion is eligible to receive over $800 million in milestone payments.
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The alliance will utilize Trubion’s small modular immunopharmaceuticals (SMIPs), a novel class of immunotherapeutics with enhanced drug properties over monoclonal and recombinant antibodies.
SMIPs are smaller than antibodies and can reach sites unavailable to larger molecules while exhibiting selective binding and long in vivo half-lives, this means the medicine is metabolized more slowly by the body suggesting less frequent dosing will be needed.
As part of the alliance, Wyeth and Trubion will collaborate on the development and commercialization of CD20-targeted therapies including TRU-015, a novel SMIP compound currently in phase II clinical development for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Wyeth will receive worldwide rights to CD20-targeted SMIPs. The companies will also collaborate on a multi-target discovery program.
As part of the transaction, Trubion received an initial $40 million payment. Trubion will retain an option to co-promote CD20-targeted therapies in the US for certain indications, while Wyeth will be responsible for future development and commercialization costs for the alliance.
Wyeth said in a statement that if all milestones in the collaboration are achieved the total payments to Trubion could exceed $800 million, excluding royalties and co-promotion fees.
“Wyeth is excited about the development of TRU-015 for RA as well as the potential application of TRU-015 in other chronic inflammatory and B cell mediated diseases,” said Dr Robert Ruffolo, president of Wyeth R&D. “We are proud to partner with Trubion because of the high quality of their science in an area that matches well with two of Wyeth’s key therapeutic areas -inflammation and oncology.”