Forma Therapeutics announced that it has signed a collaboration agreement with Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc to leverage Forma's transformative chemistry platform to discover novel antibacterial compounds for development by Cubist. Forma will receive an upfront payment, equity investment, payments for compounds delivered and research funding over the three-year collaboration term totalling up to $14 million and is eligible to receive up to an additional $54 million in milestones plus royalties on programs that Cubist elects to move into development and commercialization.

"Working collaboratively with Cubist will allow us to demonstrate the power of Forma's unique discovery platform to address the urgent need for new chemical matter in the field of antibacterial research," said Steven Tregay, CEO of Forma.

Steven Gilman, CSO/SVP Discovery and Non-Clinical Development of Cubist said, "We are very excited to be collaborating with FORMA to access their expertise in novel chemistry to address the large unmet medical need in the area of antibacterial drug resistance, such as methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and gram negative infections."

FORMA is uniquely positioned through its unprecedented combination of technological capabilities and oncology expertise to access novel target space and to develop a new generation of breakthrough oncology drugs.