Kite and Arcellx expand cell therapy partnership in deal worth over $285m

16 Nov 2023
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Deals
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Kite and Arcellx expand cell therapy partnership in deal worth over $285m
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Source: PMLiVE
Kite and Arcellx have announced an expansion to their existing collaboration, with Arcellx now set to receive a further $200m equity investment and $85m upfront cash payment from the Gilead company.
The partners originally announced an agreement in December last year to jointly develop and commercialise Arcellx’s CART-ddBCMA for relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma.
The candidate, which the US Food and Drug Administration lifted a brief partial clinical hold on in August, is currently in phase 2 clinical development and has already been granted Fast Track, Orphan Drug, and Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy designations by the US regulator.
Under the latest agreement, the companies’ collaboration for CART-ddBCMA will now include lymphomas, and Kite has also exercised its option to negotiate a licence for Arcellx’s ARC-SparX programme, ACLX-001, also in multiple myeloma.
Alongside the equity investment, which will increase Gilead’s stake in Arcellx to 13%, and cash payment, Arcellx will be eligible for potential milestone payments.
Kite’s executive vice president, Cindy Perettie, said: "We are pleased to see the momentum with the CART-ddBCMACART-ddBCMA multiple myeloma programme, enabling Kite to enter an area of high unmet need and bring a new, potentially best-in-class cell therapy to patients.
"Given this, we are deepening our relationship with Arcellx to further support advancement of CART-ddBCMA, bolster our pipeline in multiple myeloma, as well as access opportunities in lymphoma."
Rami Elghandour, Arcellx’s chairman and chief executive officer, added: "We are excited to deepen our relationship with Kite as [it continues] to invest in our platform by exercising [its] rights to our ACLX001 ARC-SparX programme in multiple myeloma and increasing [its] investment in our company.
"With this additional investment from Kite, our strengthened cash position is anticipated to extend our runway into 2027, as we advance towards commercialising CART-ddBCMA."
The announcement comes just over two weeks after Kite entered into a research collaboration and licensing agreement with Epicrispr Biotechnologies to develop new cancer cell therapies.
The partnership centres around Epic Bio’s proprietary gene regulation platform, which includes ultra-compact CRISPR components to enable in vivo delivery via a single AAV vector. Under the terms of the agreement, Epic Bio will develop constructs for Kite-selected targets for use in CAR T-cell therapies directed at blood cancers.
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