Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced that it has earned $10 million from Janssen Biotech, Inc. (Janssen) upon licensing IONIS-JBI1-2.5Rx, an orally delivered antisense drug designed to locally inhibit an undisclosed target in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract for the treatment of a GI autoimmune disease. Janssen will assume all global development, regulatory and commercialization responsibilities for IONIS-JBI1-2.5Rx once Ionis completes the IND-enabling studies.

"IONIS-JBI1-2.5Rx is the first antisense drug to enter development as part of Ionis' collaboration with Janssen to discover and develop orally administered, locally acting RNA-targeted therapeutics for autoimmune diseases in the gastrointestinal tract. We are very pleased to have rapidly advanced this first drug candidate into development within a year and a half of initiating our collaboration with Janssen," said B. Lynne Parshall, chief operating officer at Ionis Pharmaceuticals. "This new drug further expands our technology's reach into a new therapeutic setting and a new route of delivery."

Under the terms of the agreement, which covers three programs, Ionis is eligible to receive nearly $800 million in development, regulatory and sales milestone payments and license fees for these programs. In addition, Ionis will receive tiered royalties that on average are double-digits on sales from any product that is successfully commercialized.