Ribocure Pharmaceuticals AB

Boehringer Ingelheim has notched some success in the metabolic-associated steatohepatitis space so far this year. Boehringer Ingelheim is making yet another bet that RNA therapies hold the key to treating metabolic-associated steatohepatitis (MASH). The German drugmaker is paying British biotech Ochre Bio $35 million in upfront and near-term research-based milestone payments to investigate “multiple targets” for chronic liver disease. Top of the list of indications will be MASH, previously known as nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Should any of the targets in the “multi-year” collaboration prove fruitful, Ochre is also in line for various clinical, regulatory and commercial milestones as well as tiered royalties, which add up to a deal value north of $1 billion. Ochre’s remit is developing RNA therapies that enhance the liver’s regenerative capabilities in order to halt or reverse chronic liver diseases. It’s far from the first time Boehringer has played in this space—the pharma kicked off the year signing a $2 billion biobucks deal with Suzhou Ribo Life Science and Ribocure Pharmaceuticals to see whether their RNAi drug platform that targets disease-causing genes specifically in liver cells could complement Boehringer’s own MASH expertise. Six years earlier, Boehringer penned back-to-back partnerships with Dicerna Pharmaceuticals and MiNA Therapeutics covering the use of siRNA and small activating RNA to treat MASH. Boehringer put this morning’s deal with Oxford, U.K.-based Ochre in the context of its “commitment to improving the lives of people living with interconnected cardiovascular, renal and metabolic diseases, including MASH cirrhosis.” “Our partnership with Ochre Bio is driven by a shared goal to accelerate the development of new treatments for chronic liver diseases including MASH cirrhosis,” Søren Tullin, Ph.D., global head of cardiometabolic diseases research at Boehringer, said in the release. “Ochre Bio brings to the table unique and exciting capabilities in liver disease research,” Tullin added. “We believe their application of advanced genomics and machine learning coupled with human-centric translational models holds the potential to uncover novel regenerative pathways that will make a meaningful difference in the lives of those affected by chronic liver disease.” Boehringer has already notched some success in the MASH space so far this year, with the company’s Zealand Pharma-partnered glucagon/GLP-1 agonist survodutide demonstrating improvements in disease activity and liver scarring in a phase 2 trial in February.

Pictured: Boehringer Ingelheim's office in Silicon Valley/iStock, Sundry Photography German pharma Boehringer Ingelheim is paying €25 million ($27.3 million) upfront and further milestone payments of up to €670 million ($732.6 million) in a deal with Sosei Heptares to develop potential first-in-class treatments targeting all symptoms of schizophrenia, the companies announced Monday. Under the agreement, Boehringer Ingelheim has the exclusive option to license Sosei Heptares’ portfolio of GPR52 agonists, which are a G protein-coupled receptor target. Sosei is also eligible for an option payment of €60 million ($65.5 million) and possible development, regulatory and commercialization milestone payments. The London-based pharma, whose parent company is Japan’s Sosei Group Corporation, will also net customary tiered royalties on future product sales. The drug class is intended to treat the positive, negative, and cognitive symptoms of schizophrenia at the same time. Positive symptoms include hallucinations and delusions, while negative symptoms are apathy and withdrawal. Cognitive symptoms include attention, planning and memory deficits. Boehringer will have the exclusive option to license the portfolio of GPR 52 agonists after the completion of Sosei’s Phase I and Phase Ib trials and Phase II enabling activities with the antipsychotic HTL0048149. Sosei will retain control and sponsor the trials until the potential option is exercised, which is estimated to occur in 2025. The portfolio that Boehringer gains will include the HTL’149 asset and other “differentiated backup compounds” that are designed by Sosei. “This collaboration highlights the potential GPR52 has shown in preclinical research as a novel, first-in-class target for treating schizophrenia and related neurological disorders. We’re delighted to partner with Boehringer Ingelheim and leverage its leading expertise in neurological disease research and innovation,” Matt Barnes, president of Heptares Therapeutics and head of UK R&D at Sosei Heptares, said in a statement, “Together, we will focus on accelerating the development of this highly innovative program, which is currently in a Phase 1 clinical study, towards patients in need.” Hugh Marston, global head CNS discovery research at Boehringer Ingelheim, said in a statement that the partnership with Sosei “is highly complementary to our other development programs aiming to bring a new precision medicine approach to the treatment of mental health disorders with therapies, which we hope will transform the lives of those living with schizophrenia.” Boehringer has been securing several deals over the past few months. In early January 2024, the company announced it entered into a multi-target collaboration agreement with Suzhou Robi Life Science and Ribocure Pharmaceuticals to develop an siRNA treatment for nonalcoholic or metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis in a deal potentially worth over $2 billion. In November 2023, Boehringer inked a potential $509 million collaboration agreement with Phenomic AI to develop targets for stroma-rich cancers, some of the hardest cancers to treat, utilizing its single-cell RNA computing platform. Tyler Patchen is a staff writer at BioSpace. You can reach him at tyler.patchen@biospace.com. Follow him on LinkedIn.

Boehringer Ingelheim and UK-based Sosei Heptares have entered a global collaboration and option-to-license agreement to develop and commercialize Sosei’s portfolio of GPR52 agonists for schizophrenia. Under the terms of the deal, Boehringer has the exclusive option to license Sosei's GPR52 agonists, a novel G protein-coupled receptor target, following the completion of Sosei’s ongoing phase 1 and subsequent phase 1b trial and phase 2 enabling activities with HTL0048149, a first-in-class GPR52 agonist. Sosei Heptares will sponsor the trials until the option exercise, estimated in 2025. According to Boehringer, the development of a new schizophrenia treatment targeting GPR52 has the potential to address all three aspects of schizophrenia — ‘positive’ symptoms (psychosis, delusions and hallucinations), ‘negative’ symptoms (social withdrawal and apathy) and cognitive symptoms (attention, planning and memory deficits). In the deal, Sosei will receive an upfront payment of $27.3 million (€25 million) from Boehringer, and is eligible for an option exercise payment of $65.6 million (€60 million) and further development, regulatory and commercialization milestone payments totaling up to $732.7 million (€670 million). Boehringer Ingelheim has inked several deals since the start of 2024. In January , the German drugmaker signed at $2 billion+ deal with Suzhou Ribo Life Science subsidiary Ribocure Pharmaceuticals to develop treatments for nonalcoholic or metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (NASH/MASH). This was quickly followed by a second research partnership with 3T Biosciences — this time for $538.5 million — to develop first-in-class immuno-oncology treatments.