Compugen Ltd., a leader in predictive discovery and development of first-in-class therapeutics for cancer immunotherapy, announced it entered into an exclusive license agreement with MedImmune, the global biologics research and development arm of AstraZeneca, to enable the development of bi-specific and multi-specific immuno-oncology antibody products.

Under the terms of the agreement, Compugen will provide an exclusive license to MedImmune for the development of bi-specific and multi-specific antibody products derived from a Compugen pipeline program. MedImmune has the right to create multiple products under this license and will be solely responsible for all research, development and commercial activities under the agreement. Compugen will receive a $10 million upfront payment and is eligible to receive up to $200 million in development, regulatory and commercial milestones for the first product as well as tiered royalties on future product sales. If additional products are developed, additional milestones and royalties would be due to Compugen. Compugen will retain all other rights to its entire pipeline of programs as monotherapies and in combination with other products.

"We are excited to announce our agreement with MedImmune, a global leader in the development of antibody-based oncology therapeutics," said Anat Cohen-Dayag, PhD, president and CEO of Compugen. "This licensing deal allows us to monetize specific scientific advances in our programs, while we continue to advance our lead programs into clinical trials." Dr. Cohen-Dayag added, "We are committed to our strategy of selectively collaborating with biopharmaceutical companies for the development of first-in-class products against our diverse, computationally-derived portfolio of targets."

"This agreement with Compugen will support our abilities to generate novel immunotherapy targets which, coupled with MedImmune's expertise in antibody engineering, can advance our goal of delivering treatments to meaningfully improve the lives of cancer patients," said Ronald Herbst, vice president, Oncology Research & Development, MedImmune.

Antibodies are naturally occurring components of the immune system that bind specifically to a target protein via two identical arms. Through genetic engineering, antibodies can be modified to bind to different proteins through the two separate arms by exchanging one arm with that of another antibody with a different target specificity (bi-specific antibodies). Alternatively, additional features can be engineered into an antibody to allow binding to three or more target proteins simultaneously (multi-specific antibodies). These engineered forms of antibodies are increasingly being developed as therapeutics, as they enable multiple mechanisms of action for treating disease within a single molecule.