Roche enters into second collaboration with Jnana to address complex drug targets

Roche has entered into a second collaboration and licensing agreement with Jnana Therapeutics for the discovery of small molecule drugs for the treatment of challenging-to-drug cancer, immune-mediated and neurological diseases.

Under the terms of the agreement, Roche will give an upfront payment of $50m to Jnana, who will also be eligible for significant near-term milestone payments and additional potential future payments that could exceed $2bn, as well as tiered royalties.

The collaboration will see Jnana conduct discovery and preclinical activities against multiple cancer, immune-mediated and neurological disease targets, with Roche responsible for development and commercialisation of any resulting products.

The partnership was announced on the same day Jnana announced the closing of its $107m series C funding to progress JNT-517, its lead candidate in the treatment of phenylketonuria, a rare genetic metabolic disease.

Jnana’s proprietary RAPID chemoproteomics platform enabled the identification of the compound, and will be used under the latest Roche/Jnana collaboration.

"We have been impressed by Jnana's team and their RAPID drug discovery platform, as part of our first collaboration that focused on SLC metabolite transporters," said James Sabry, global head of Roche Pharma Partnering.

He continued: "As fostering truly symbiotic partnerships with our partners where we learn and grow together is a key focus of our overall partnering strategy, we are excited to now build on our successful existing collaboration with Jnana to address new target classes as we expand our efforts to discover new medicines for patients with cancer, immune and neurological diseases."

The earlier collaboration between the companies, announced in July 2020, focused on small molecule drugs directed at SLC transporters, an important class of more than 450 human membrane proteins that are gatekeepers for controlling the movement of metabolites in and out of cells and organs. Roche paid Jnana $40m upfront, with the aggregate value of potential future payments to Jnana exceeding $1bn.

"We are excited to partner with Roche, one of the largest healthcare companies and a strong collaborator, for a second time," said Joanne Kotz, co-founder and chief executive officer of Jnana.

"Roche has been a valuable strategic partner and we are proud that our success to date has led to the opportunity to broaden our work together in immune-mediated and neurological diseases, as well as to extend our collaboration into cancer,” she added.