TEL AVIV, ISRAEL -- Compugen Ltd. (NASDAQ: CGEN) disclosed today that it has achieved a second milestone in its cancer immunotherapy collaboration it entered last year with Bayer HealthCare (Bayer). The collaboration provides for the research, development, and commercialization of antibody-based cancer therapeutics against two novel Compugen-discovered immune checkpoint regulators. The milestone being announced today relates to the second preclinical milestone for one of the checkpoint protein candidates. The achievement of the initial milestone for this candidate was announced in July of this year.
About the Compugen/Bayer HealthCare Collaboration and License Agreement
Under the terms of a collaboration and license agreement signed in August 2013, Compugen and Bayer are jointly pursuing a preclinical research program for antibody-based cancer immunotherapy against two novel Compugen-discovered immune checkpoint regulators. Subsequently, Bayer will have full control over further development and have worldwide commercialization rights for potential cancer therapeutics. Compugen received an upfront payment of $10 million and is eligible to receive over $500 million in potential milestone payments for both checkpoint programs, plus an additional $30 million of potential milestone payments associated with joint preclinical research for the two programs, which includes payments related to the two milestones achieved to date. Compugen is also eligible to receive royalties on global net sales from any resulting products under the collaboration.
About Cancer Immunotherapy
Latest cancer immunotherapies have demonstrated impressive clinical benefit, even for end-stage patients with difficult-to-treat tumors such as metastatic melanoma and non-small cell lung cancer. Unlike conventional cancer therapies, which act by directly targeting the cancer cells, often resulting in only transient clinical responses as cancer cells become resistant, clinical responses to cancer immunotherapy tend to be durable, sometimes resulting in dramatic long-term survival and the absence of resistance or recurrences.
About Compugen
Compugen is a leading drug discovery company focused on therapeutic proteins and monoclonal antibodies to address important unmet needs in the fields of oncology and immunology. The Company utilizes a broad and continuously growing integrated infrastructure of proprietary scientific understandings and predictive platforms, algorithms, machine learning systems and other computational biology capabilities for the in silico (by computer) prediction and selection of product candidates, which are then advanced in its Pipeline Program. The Company's business model includes collaborations covering the further development and commercialization of product candidates at various stages from its Pipeline Program and various forms of research and discovery agreements, in both cases providing Compugen with potential milestone payments and royalties on product sales or other forms of revenue sharing. Compugen’s wholly-owned U.S. subsidiary located in South San Francisco is developing oncology and immunology monoclonal antibody therapeutic candidates against its drug targets. For additional information, please visit Compugen's corporate website at www.cgen.com.
