Compugen Earns $10M Milestone from AstraZeneca's Phase 3 Biliary Tract Cancer Trial

Compugen Ltd., a company specializing in cancer immunotherapy and computational target discovery, has announced that it will receive a $10 million milestone payment from AstraZeneca. This payment follows the dosing of the first patient in AstraZeneca’s ARTEMIDE-Bil01 clinical trial, which involves rilvegostomig. Rilvegostomig is a bispecific antibody that targets PD-1 and TIGIT, the latter being derived from Compugen’s anti-TIGIT antibody, COM902. The Phase 3 trial aims to recruit approximately 750 patients from over 20 countries with biliary tract cancer, who will receive either rilvegostomig or a placebo along with investigator-chosen chemotherapy after surgical resection.

Anat Cohen-Dayag, Ph.D., the President, and CEO of Compugen, expressed enthusiasm about the trial’s progression, highlighting the milestone payment as a significant achievement. She emphasized that the partnership with AstraZeneca aligns with Compugen’s strategy to expand commercialization opportunities for its product pipeline, particularly focusing on bispecific therapies. This move complements Compugen’s ongoing development of COM902 in combination with COM701, an anti-PVRIG antibody that could be first in its class.

The agreement between Compugen and AstraZeneca, established in 2018, grants AstraZeneca exclusive rights to use Compugen's monospecific antibodies, including COM902, for developing bispecific and multispecific antibody products, with certain exclusions. Under this agreement, AstraZeneca is responsible for all facets of research, development, and commercialization. Compugen has already received $25.5 million up to this point, comprising an initial $10 million payment and several milestone payments, out of a possible $200 million in total milestone payments. Additionally, Compugen is entitled to tiered royalties from future product sales. Further milestones and royalties could follow if more bi- or multi-specific therapies are developed using Compugen's antibodies.

Compugen is known for its predictive computational discovery capabilities, which it uses to find new drug targets and biological pathways to develop cancer immunotherapies. Its product candidates include COM701, an anti-PVRIG antibody, and COM902, an anti-TIGIT antibody. Compugen also has a partnered program with AstraZeneca for rilvegostomig, now in Phase 3, and another program licensed to Gilead. This latter program involves a high-affinity antibody, COM503, which targets the interaction between IL-18 binding protein and IL-18 to inhibit tumor growth.

Compugen is headquartered in Israel and has an office in San Francisco, CA. Its shares are traded on both Nasdaq and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol CGEN.