A separate but related evaluation license agreement has been entered into between University of California, San Diego (UCSD) Office of Technology Transfer and Intellectual Property Services and Medarex for the associated intellectual property. Under the terms of the agreements, UCSD will provide specific cancer targets discovered in the Cancer Center’s research laboratories, and Medarex has the option to develop and commercialize antibody therapeutics to those cancer targets. UCSD will retain diagnostic rights.
“This is an approach that we think will save time and money in the cancer drug development process,” said Cancer Center director Dennis Carson.
Antibody-based therapeutics are designed to target specific molecules and are among cancer therapies available today, including Erbitux, Avastin, Herceptin and Rituxan.