Malcolm Weir, Heptares CEO told us the agreement is a single target deal aimed at delivering novel small molecule drug candidates.
Heptares, a wholly owned subsidiary of Sosei Group Corporation that focuses on medicines targeting G protein-coupled receptor (GPCRs), will receive an upfront payment of $4m and research funding of approximately $8m.
The company is also eligible to receive additional research, development, and commercialization milestone payments in addition to royalties on net sales of products resulting from the alliance.
Per the agreement, Heptares will apply its StaR platform to engineer thermally stabilized forms of a GPCR nominated by Daiichi Sankyo, which it says plays a “crucial role in relieving pain.”
Heptares will also apply its structure-based design capabilities, including advanced structural biology and rational drug design approaches, X-ray crystallography, and fragment screening.
“Structural insights may enable Heptares and Daiichi to design a much more selective drug with a better efficacy/safety profile,” Weir added.
Daiichi will be responsible for taking promising drug candidates through clinical trials and commercialization.
“The first step is to create the stabilized version of the GPCR target (the StaR protein), and undertake the steps needed to generate high resolution X-ray structural information,” Weir explained.
Additionally, he said the agreement is further validation of its GPCR Structure-based drug design (SBDD) approach and adds to the register of pharma partners signed up in recent years, including Allergan, AstraZeneca, Teva, and Pfizer.
It also provides revenues to enable Heptares/Sosei to advance development of its own proprietary pipeline, Weir commented.