Royalty Pharma, a leader in acquiring royalty interests in marketed and late stage biopharmaceutical products, announced that, pursuant to a collaboration with Aisling Capital and Clarus Ventures, it has sold to Aisling and Clarus approximately 20% of the royalty interest in ibrutinib it recently acquired from Quest Diagnostics for a pro rata percentage of the $485 million Royalty Pharma paid to Quest for the royalty.
"The Clarus and Aisling teams' expertise in early-stage and development-stage companies and therapies added real value during the course of our collective consideration of this opportunity. We greatly enjoyed working with Aisling and Clarus and look forward to future potential joint opportunities in which we can pool our resources and expertise," said Pablo Legorreta, founder and chief executive officer of Royalty Pharma. "The ibrutinib transaction marks Royalty Pharma's third pre-FDA approval investment in 18 months. We see many other quality pre-approval products where Royalty Pharma could provide liquidity to drug developers by pulling forward future revenues. Such high-quality pre-approval investment opportunities are an excellent complement to Royalty Pharma's core business of acquiring royalty assets on approved drugs," added Legorreta.
"This collaboration brought together the capabilities of each firm in an extremely effective manner," noted Dennis Purcell, senior managing director at Aisling Capital.
"Ibrutinib is an important advance in the treatment of multiple B-cell malignancies," added Nick Simon, managing director at Clarus Ventures. "We are excited to be part of the story."
Pharmacyclics and Janssen Pharmaceutical's ibrutinib was filed with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in July 2013 for relapsed/refractory mantle cell lymphoma and relapsed/refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia after receiving Breakthrough Therapy Designation from FDA earlier this year. Ibrutinib has received three of the eight Breakthrough Therapy Designations granted by the FDA to date in oncology.
Royalty Pharma is the industry leader in acquiring royalty interests in marketed and late stage biopharmaceutical products. With over $10 billion in assets, Royalty Pharma owns royalty interests in 41 marketed and late stage biopharmaceutical products, including Abbott's Humira, Johnson and Johnson's Remicade and Prezista, Gilead's Atripla, Truvada, Complera and Emtriva, Pfizer's Lyrica, Amgen's Neupogen and Neulasta, Genentech's Rituxan, Astella's Lexiscan, Merck's Januvia/Janumet, Roche's Mircera, UCB's Cimzia, Biogen Idec's Tecfidera and Pharmacyclics' ibrutinib.
Clarus Ventures is a life sciences venture capital firm founded by a team of accomplished investment and operating professionals.
Aisling Capital is a life sciences-dedicated venture capital firm with over US$1.6 billion under management.