Evotec and Bristol Myers Squibb Extend and Expand Strategic Neurodegeneration Partnership

Rare Daily Staff

Evotec said it has extended and expanded its strategic neurodegeneration partnership with Bristol Myers Squibb, originally signed with Celgene at the end of 2016.

The initial partnership proved highly productive in generating a promising pipeline of discovery to clinical-stage program. Based on its success, Bristol Myers Squibb and Evotec decided to extend and expand this partnership for an additional 8 years with the goal to further broaden and deepen the strategic alliance.

Evotec and Bristol Myers Squibb (formerly “Celgene”) initiated the collaboration in 2016 to identify disease-modifying treatments for a broad range of neurodegenerative diseases. Currently approved drugs only offer short-term management of patients’ symptoms and there is a significant unmet medical need for therapies that slow down or reverse disease progression in the field of neurodegenerative diseases.

The partnership pursues an innovative approach to the discovery and development of novel medicines by leveraging several of Evotec’s modality-agnostic precision medicine platforms. The partnership has already been successful in generating a pipeline of discovery and pre-clinical programs. A first program, EVT8683, was in-licensed by Bristol Myers Squibb in September 2021, following the successful filing of an IND application with the FDA and has proceeded into the clinical phase I.

“This next extension beyond 2030 is a testament to the success and trust of the partnership as well as to the high degree of confidence placed in our platforms and the complementary approach to generate a leading pipeline of highly innovative drug candidates,” said Cord Dohrmann, chief scientific officer of Evotec.

Under the new agreement, Evotec will receive $50 million upfront, undisclosed license and performance milestone payments, as well as tiered royalties up to low double-digit percentages on product sales for a potential total deal value of $4 billion.

“We look forward to continuing our drug discovery research into key mechanisms in neurodegeneration and delivering potential therapeutic candidates for patients who are suffering from these devastating diseases,” said Richard Hargreaves, senior vice president Neuroscience at Bristol Myers Squibb.