Celgene Strikes Deal Worth Nearly $1 Billion for Blood Cancer Treatment

Celgene has struck another collaborative deal, even as the large pharmaceutical company is in the process of being folded into the operations of its new owner, Bristol-Myers Squibb. This morning, privately-owned drug developer Triphase Accelerator, along with its majority shareholder FACIT, announced it had struck a collaborative deal with Celgene. The companies will harness their knowledge and resources to develop a first-in-class preclinical therapeutic targeting the WDR5 protein for the treatment of blood cancers including leukemia. The deal to develop TRPH-395, a novel small molecule inhibitor that disrupts WDR5 protein-protein interactions, could be worth up to nearly $1 billion.
Under terms of the deal, Celgene will pay Triphase $40 million in upfront funding. Celgene can then pay up to an additional $940 million if certain milestones are hit. The deal provides Celgene with an option to acquire RPH-395 from Toronto-based Triphase Accelerator. According to Triphase, preclinical data for TRPH-395 showed that the compound demonstrated broad anti-proliferative activity across a wide range of cancer cell lines. Blood cancers like leukemia can result when WDR5-associated protein complexes are not appropriately regulated in the body. The WDR5 protein is critical for the formation and activities of certain protein complexes that are associated with DNA and indirectly modify genes. Drug compounds that can disrupt these cancer-causing cellular activities represent a novel therapeutic approach, which may also improve clinical outcomes in patients with solid tumors, Triphase Accelerator said in its statement.