UniQure To Sell Royalty Interest In HEMGENIX For Up To $400 Mln

(RTTNews) - Gene therapy company uniQure N.V. (QURE) announced Monday it has entered into a definitive agreement to sell a portion of the royalty rights due to uniQure from CSL Behring from the net sales of HEMGENIX (etranacogene dezaparvovec-drbl) to HealthCare Royalty (HCRx) and Sagard Healthcare for a gross purchase price of up to $400 million in cash.

Under the terms of the agreement, uniQure will receive an upfront cash payment of $375 million in exchange for the lowest royalty tier on CSL Behring's worldwide net sales of HEMGENIX up to 1.85 times the purchase price until June 30, 2032 or, if such cap is not met by June 30, 2032, up to 2.25x the purchase price through December 31, 2038.

uniQure also is eligible to receive an additional $25 million milestone payment if 2024 net sales of HEMGENIX exceed a pre-specified threshold. uniQure will retain the rights to all other royalties under its existing Commercialization and License Agreement with CSL Behring.

It will also retain contractual milestones totaling up to $1.5 billion, including the $100 million milestone for the first U.S. product sale and the $75 million milestone for the first product sale in one of five major European countries if achieved prior to July 2, 2023. The transaction is expected to close no later than 15 business days from signing.

uniQure expects the transaction will extend its cash runway into the second quarter of 2026, assuming receipt of the contractual milestone payment for the first sale of HEMGENIX in the U.S.