Financial conditions make it difficult to raise capital from the public markets, so BridgeBio is turning to licensing deals as a way to bring in capital.The company has agreed out of license Bristol Myers Squibb is entitled to a drug used to treat hard-to-treat cancer in exchange for an upfront payment of $90 million.
The deal announced Thursday gave struggling BridgeBio some needed cash. The Palo Alto, California-based biotech has been laying off workers and restructuring its operations. Phase 3 failure of its lead drug candidate in rare diseases in late 2021. in its report First Quarter Financial Results Last week, BridgeBio told investors it would license some of its projects as a way to hone its focus on certain projects and save capital. The BridgeBio pipeline has more than 30 projects in various stages of development; the company has identified six companies that are looking for partners.
For BMS, the deal makes it a contender in the increasingly competitive field of cancer drug research. BridgeBio’s drug BBP-398 is a small molecule designed to block SHP2, a protein in the RAS signaling pathway that drives cancer growth. Overactivity of SHP2 causes many forms of cancer, and blocking the protein may offer another therapeutic option. The BMS deal gives the pharma giant an opportunity in this approach, putting it in competition with clinical-stage drug candidates in development such as Novartis, Sanofi’s Revolution Medicines and Roche’s Relay Therapeutics.
Under the terms of the agreement with BMS, BridgeBio will continue to lead the ongoing Phase 1 development of BBP-398, either as a monotherapy or in combination with the BMS checkpoint inhibitor Opdivo. BMS will take over development of the drug as it enters the next phase of clinical trials and passes potential regulatory submissions and commercialization. BridgeBio will receive up to $815 million in milestone payments and royalties on sales of the approved products. If the California company chooses to fund some of the drug’s late-stage clinical development, it could receive higher royalties in the United States.
The agreement builds on an earlier partnership.Last July, BMS and BridgeBio announced that they would cooperate In developing BBP-398 in combination with Opdivo to treat patients with advanced solid tumors with mutations in the KRAS gene, part of the RAS gene family. Both parties agreed to co-fund clinical trials.
“We have seen the potential role that SHP2 inhibition could play in unlocking possible combination therapies to treat patients with a range of cancers. We hope this collaboration with BridgeBio will help us maximize the potential of BBP-398 inhibition of SHP2 for patients sex,” said Rupert Vessey, executive vice president of research and early development at BMS, in a prepared statement.
BridgeBio’s early deal with BMS is non-exclusive, and the company has an earlier partner in the development of BBP-398. Synbiotics has the right to develop the drug in mainland China and other Asian markets. BridgeBio is also testing its experimental therapy and working with Amgen’s Lumakras, which last year became the first drug approved to treat KRAS mutationsThe FDA’s regulatory nod to Amgen’s drug covers non-small cell lung cancer characterized by a specific mutation called KRAS G12c.
BridgeBio reported a cash position of $633.5 million in its first-quarter financial results, which the company estimates will last through 2024.
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