AZ and Horizon in cancer tie-up
pharmafile | January 8, 2014 | News story | Research and Development, Sales and Marketing | AstraZeneca, Cancer, horizon, medimunne
AstraZeneca has signed a deal with British biotech firm Horizon Discovery to look at a number of genotypes to see whether they might be useful in developing cancer treatments.
The companies are tight-lipped about money, with no word on how much Horizon is receiving up front – although the firm could receive as much as $88 million in milestones, assuming various targets (which are again undisclosed) are met.
Horizon, based in Cambridge, already has close links to AstraZeneca: in April last year the two collaborated on Horizon’s first-in-class kinase target programme, HD-001.
Under the new deal, Horizon will check out the genotypes for what is called ‘synthetic lethality’ – that is, where the combination of mutations in two or more genes leads to the death of a cell, but a mutation in only one gene does not.
Establishing this is one of Horizon’s specialities and has great potential for oncology, because the pairs of mutations may be used to kill cancer cells without severely damaging normal ones.
In vitro screening will be done with Horizon’s proprietary siRNA Platform: the firm’s X-MAN isogenic cell lines – created by the genome-editing GENESIS platform – model the mutations found in cancer patients.
Such models are attractive to researchers since they can streamline target identification and validation, assay development, screening and clinical trial design – and AstraZeneca has the option to take on exclusively any targets which look promising.
Horizon chief executive Darrin Disley hailed the deal, saying: “Horizon is uniquely placed in the translational genomics field for investigation of synthetic lethality, as our X-MAN isogenic disease models incorporate patient-relevant genetic context, and allow large scale, timely and systematic screens for the first time.”
Susan Galbraith, head of AstraZeneca’s oncology innovative medicines unit, said: “Partnering Horizon’s excellent capabilities in synthetic lethal screens and validation with our strong oncology discovery and development expertise offers real potential to address the need for novel cancer therapeutics, and ultimately to make a difference to patients.”
AstraZeneca has been busy doing deals of late, with biologics arm Medimmune buying biotech firm Spirogen in a $460 million arrangement in October 2013.
September also saw the firm pay Merck $50 million up front for a worldwide licensing deal for one its investigational cancer drugs.
Adam Hill
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