Alpine Immune Sciences, Inc.

Vertex Pharmaceuticals has struck a deal with AbCellera to develop new types of T-cell engagers for autoimmune diseases and, potentially, other conditions too.AbCellera will receive $28 million up front in the partnership announced Wednesday, and is eligible for more in the form of unspecified milestone payments and sales royalties. The Vancouver-based biotechnology company will lead discovery and early development, while Vertex will fund all research and development costs and have the right to commercialize any medicines emerging from the partnership.The alliance adds to a growing streak of business development activity centered around multifaceted antibody drugs that engage immune cells as well as disease targets. Several of these T-cell engagers are approved for certain blood cancers and other malignancies. But their reach still remains somewhat limited, leading to a push to advance newer approaches that can address a wider range of conditions.One increasingly popular area among developers is autoimmune disease research, where many emerging programs are designed to eradicate defective B cells. That approach is seen as a potential alternative to personalized cell therapies that have also shown promise, and has drawn considerable attention from larger drugmakers. UCB, for instance, paid $2.2 billion to acquire startup Candid Therapeutics in May. Merck & Co, Sanofi and Gilead have also cut notable deals.For Vertex, the partnership provides another opportunity to branch out from a cystic fibrosis business that brings in over $10 billion in yearly sales. Vertex has become one of the industrys most valuable companies thanks to its products that target the genetic disease, but has had a tougher time replicating that success elsewhere.The company has shown an interest in autoimmune conditions, purchasing Alpine Immune Sciences two years ago for a drug that recently succeeded in late-stage testing. It also recently zeroed in on endocrine diseases via its biggest acquisition to date, a $10 billion buyout of Crinetics Pharmaceuticals. '

Vertex Pharmaceuticals has struck a $10 billion deal—its largest ever—to acquire Crinetics Pharmaceuticals. And while the transaction brings Vertex a newly approved potential blockbuster in Palsonify, there is another compound in the company’s rare disease pipeline that may have greater upside. During a conference call on Monday afternoon, Vertex execs were effusive in their excitement over atumelnant, an investigative treatment for congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), which also has shown potential as a therapy for Cushing syndrome. Firing the imagination of Vertex’s leaders were results from a phase 2 trial of the adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) receptor antagonist. “When we saw that data, we were floored. That is very, very important to this field,” Vertex CEO Reshma Kewalramani, M.D., said on the call. The company’s chief commercial officer Duncan McKechnie added during the call that the results were the “holy grail” in the indication. And with that, the Boston company went after Crinetics hard. Vertex is paying $85 per share, which is a 102% premium on its price of $42.03 at the close of the market on Monday, moments before the transaction was announced. With the deal, Vertex’s share price dropped by 2%. Vertex estimates that Palsonify and atumelnant will add more than $5 billion in peak sales potential to its portfolio. “The deal is on the higher side on a stock price premium basis and investors will debate this, but we view this as reasonable if the peak sales number can be achieved,” William Blair analyst Myles Minter, Ph.D., wrote in a note to clients. “Based on management commentary, we believe significantly more of the greater than $5 billion peak sales potential is weighted toward the atumelnant opportunity, which carries more risk given the late-clinical-stage nature of the ACTH receptor antagonist.” The companies, which expect the deal to close in the third quarter, match up well. While Vertex is focused on specialty diseases, and its cystic fibrosis (CF) portfolio accounted for 93% of its $12 billion in revenue in 2025, it has a need to branch out. Crinetics brings its specialization in endocrine diseases. “This is exactly the kind of deal that fits us perfectly,” Kewalramani said. The transaction provides Vertex with a fifth pillar in its portfolio as endocrine joins CF, hematology, pain and renal. In Crinetics, Vertex is acquiring “highly differentiated, best-in-class molecules,” as is the case with its CF offerings, McKechnie added. One of those is Palsonify, which was approved in September of last year for acromegaly, a disorder which causes excess growth hormone in adults, leading to enlargements of a patient’s face, hands, jaw and feet. The daily oral treatment, which is priced annually at $290,000 in the United States, gives patients a convenience edge to infusions “without sacrificing efficacy,” Leerink Partners said upon Palsonify’s approval. Crinetics reported Palsonify’s first quarter sales at $10.7 million, which topped analysts’ consensus and were up from $5.4 million in the fourth quarter of last year. The acquisition comes two years after Vertex bought out Alpine Immune Sciences and its dual B cell cytokine agonist povetacicept, which the company believes has best-in-class potential as a treatment for IgA nephropathy (IgAN). The treatment, which has a Nov, 30 FDA decision date, has been pegged by S&P Global to achieve peak global sales of $4.3 billion. The Vertex-Crinetics buyout also adds to the splurge of biopharma M&A activity in 2026. It is the fourth deal this year of at least $10 billion with the others all coming in the second quarter: Sun Pharma’s $11.75 acquisition of Organon, AbbVie’s $10.9 billion buyout of Apogee, and GSK’s $10.6 billion takeover of Nuvalent.

In its biggest M&A move to-date, Vertex Pharmaceuticals on Monday revealed plans to acquire Crinetics Pharmaceuticals for $85 per share, valuing the takeout at about $10 billion. The deal, slated to close in the third quarter, will hand Vertex a portfolio of endocrinology assets that includes Palsonify (paltusotine), an oral non-peptide somatostatin receptor type 2 (SST2) agonist approved in the US and EU as a first-line treatment for adults with acromegaly.Since its US launch in the fourth quarter of 2025, Palsonify has brought in about $15.7 million in net product revenue, which Vertex said speaks to the drug's "strong demand across all patient segments, prescribing activity expansion, and growing reimbursement coverage." After the acromegaly treatment beat consensus expectations in its first quarter on the market, FirstWord pegged the biotech as a likely takeout target (see – Vital Signs: The seller's marketplace heading into JPM)."We believe Vertex can build on the strong momentum of the Palsonify launch by applying our experience in commercialising medicines for rare genetic diseases," Vertex CEO Reshma Kewalramani said in a company release. The drugmaker got its start in cystic fibrosis, an orphan disease, and thanks to that business's success — which generated more than $11 billion in revenue last year — Vertex has been able to leverage that cash to expand its therapeutic reach into the gene therapy, pain and renal spaces. However, some of the company's forays have yet to bear fruit. While Journavx (suzetrigine) became the first non-opioid pain relief pill approved in over two decades, it's unlikely to move from the acute treatment setting into the chronic. And uptake for the one-time sickle cell and haemophilia treatment Casgevy (exagamglogene autotemcel), like other gene therapies, continues to be stymied by high costs, a lack of insurance coverage, a limited number of treatment centres and its lengthy, complex treatment protocols — though the CRISPR therapy did win a paediatric label expansion in the US last week (see – Physician Views Results: Sickle cell gene therapies continue to face meaningful headwinds).Before Crinetics, Vertex's biggest purchase was its $4.9-billion buyout of Alpine Immune Sciences in 2024, which gave it povetacicept. The dual APRIL/BAFF inhibitor is currently under FDA review for IgA nephropathy (IgAN) with a Nov. 30 PDUFA date (see – Spotlight On: Vertex buys Alpine for $4.9B – Four key takeaways).Earlier this year, Kewalramani claimed its flagship cystic fibrosis franchise could eventually be surpassed by its renal business, which includes two additional kidney programmes behind povetacicept (see – Spotlight On: Vertex's renal pipeline approaches an inflection point).Endocrinology pipelineWhile Vertex waits for povetacicept's approval, Monday's deal for Crinetics gives the company an already-commercial product — though it doesn't have as sky-high of financial hopes for the endocrinology assets it's gaining. Between Palsonify and Crinetics most advanced clinical programme, atumelnant, Vertex is projecting a combined peak annual revenue of more than $5 billion.Atumelnant is a once-daily oral adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) receptor antagonist in a Phase III study for congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), a rare genetic disease characterised by impaired cortisol synthesis and excess androgen production.In Phase II testing, patients with CAH who received atumelnant achieved near normal levels of androgen on physiologic replacement doses of glucocorticoids. Early data shared in 2024 showed "rapid, profound, and sustained suppression" of androstenedione and 17-hydroxyprogesterone levels.Crinetics is also studying the candidate in Cushing's syndrome. Behind atumelnant, the biotech's pipeline includes CRN09682, in a Phase I/II study for neuroendocrine neoplasms, and at least five preclinical programmes in development for indications spanning Graves' disease, thyroid eye disease, polycystic kidney disease, obesity and diabetes.