Celgene and Immatics Biotechnologies, a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company developing T-cell redirecting cancer immunotherapies, have formed a strategic collaboration and option agreement to develop adoptive cell therapies targeting multiple cancers. Under the deal, Immatics will receive an upfront payment of $75 million for three programs and may be eligible to receive up to $505 million for each licensed product in option-exercise payments, development, regulatory and commercial milestone payments as well as tiered royalties on net sales.

The deal involves the use of certain proprietary technologies from Immatics. Immatics may develop T-cell-receptor-engineered T-cell therapy (TCR-T) programs against solid tumor targets discovered with Immatics’ XPRESIDENT technology, a high-throughput technology capable of identifying targets in cancers. The programs would use proprietary T-cell receptors (TCRs) identified by Immatics’ XCEPTOR TCR discovery and engineering platform.

If Immatics develops programs against the TCR-T targets, Immatics will be responsible for the development and validation of these programs through the lead-candidate stage, at which time Celgene may exercise opt-in rights and assume sole responsibility for further worldwide development, manufacturing and commercialization of the TCR-T-cell therapies. Immatics would have certain early stage co-development rights or co-funding rights for selected TCR-T-cell therapies arising from the collaboration.

Source: Immatics Biotechnology