Gilead, Tubulis Partner To Develop ADC Candidate For Solid Tumor Target

(RTTNews) - Gilead Sciences, Inc. (Nasdaq: GILD) and Tubulis Tuesday said they have entered into an option and license agreement to discover and develop an antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) against a solid tumor target.

According to NIH, antibody-drug conjugates are a class of drugs designed as a targeted therapy for treating disease. Currently they are widely used for the treatment of cancer.

With this agreement, the companies plan to discover and develop an ADC candidate leveraging Tubulis' proprietary Tubutecan and Alco5 platforms.

As per the deal, Tubulis will receive an upfront payment of $20 million and, if Gilead exercises its option, a separate option exercise fee of $30 million. Tubulis is also entitled to get development and commercialization milestone payments of up to $415 million, plus mid-single to low double-digit tiered royalties on sales.

Early-stage research and development for ADC program will be led by Tubulis. Gilead will be responsible for further development and commercialization, if it exercises its option to exclusively license the program.