Entera Bio & Amgen Enter Strategic Research Collaboration
Entera Bio Ltd. recently announced it has entered into a research collaboration and license agreement with Amgen in inflammatory disease and other serious illnesses. Entera will use its proprietary drug delivery platform to develop oral formulations for one preclinical large molecule program that Amgen has selected. Amgen also has an option to select up to two additional programs to include in the collaboration.
“We are excited to leverage our proprietary oral drug delivery platform in collaboration with Amgen, a leader in the development of large molecule and biologic treatments in inflammatory disease and numerous other disorders,” said Dr. Phillip Schwartz, Chief Executive Officer of Entera. “This collaboration is an important validation of our platform technology. Importantly, the first program included in this agreement is very different from the Oral PTH (1-34) in Entera’s pipeline, highlighting the broad applicability of our technology.”
Under the terms of the agreement, Entera will receive a modest initial technology access fee from Amgen and will be responsible for preclinical development at Amgen’s expense. Entera will be eligible to receive up to $270 million in aggregate payments, as well as tiered royalties up to mid-single digits, upon achievement of various clinical and commercial milestones if Amgen decides to move all of these programs forward. Amgen is responsible for clinical development, manufacturing, and commercialization of any of the resulting programs.
Entera will retain all intellectual property rights to its drug delivery technology, which under this collaboration will be licensed to Amgen exclusively for Amgen’s nominated drug targets. Amgen will retain all rights to its large molecules and any subsequent improvements.
Entera Bio is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of orally delivered large molecule therapeutics for use in orphan indications and other areas with significant unmet medical needs. The company is initially applying its technology to develop an oral formulation of a human parathyroid hormone analog, Oral PTH (1-34), for treatment of hypoparathyroidism, and osteoporosis.
Entera’s proprietary platform technology consists of two components: a small molecule that enhances the absorption of a large molecule therapeutic agents and a second component that “protects” the large molecule from digestion in the gastrointestinal tract. This synergistic system is intended to increase oral bioavailability and decrease the variability associated with the oral administration of large molecule biologics and synthetic protein therapeutic agents.
Currently, biological entities and other large molecules can only be delivered via injections and or other non-oral pathways. However, oral drug delivery is the easiest method for self-administering medications, offers patients greater dosing flexibility, and has the highest patient acceptance and compliance rates as compared to all other routes of drug administration. For more information, visit www.enterabio.com.
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