Ambit Biosciences has entered a screening, discovery and development collaboration with Cephalon, Inc. aimed at establishing best-in-class kinase inhibitors as candidates for clinical research. By combining Ambit’s KinomeScan-driven discovery capabilities with Cephalon’s chemistry, discovery and development capabilities, the two companies expect to discover and develop small molecule pharmaceutical products in significantly less time.

Kinases consist of more than 500 related enzymes that play an important role in a range of human ailments, including cancer, inflammation, diabetes, infection, cardiovascular disease and central nervous system disorders.

“While they are our fourth major collaborator, Cephalon is the first pharmaceutical company to take complete advantage of Ambit’s proprietary discovery platform,” said Scott Salka, chief executive officer of Ambit. “The cornerstone of the collaboration is Ambit’s unequaled ability to screen chemical libraries across a panel of 300 kinases, which will be used to rapidly annotate Cephalon’s focused library of potential kinase inhibitors.”

“Our structurally diverse, proprietary chemical library of kinase inhibitors is among our most valuable assets. We see this collaboration as an opportunity to extract the maximum value from this asset in the shortest period of time,” said Jeffrey Vaught, Ph.D., executive vice president, R&D at Cephalon. “Ambit’s technology will allow us to identify the best compounds for further research and to continue improving those we select through ongoing and iterative screening integrated tightly with our own medicinal chemistry and pharmacology efforts.”

Cephalon will pay an up-front fee of $18 million to Ambit for access to its KinomeScan technology. In addition, the companies will collaborate on advancing two programs targeting undisclosed kinases, with Ambit having primary responsibility for delivering clinical candidates that Cephalon will further develop in exchange for additional milestone payments to Ambit of as much as $232.5 million and royalties on commercial sales. Ambit will also have the opportunity to use Cephalon’s library of compounds to discover and develop products that are effective inhibitors of certain undisclosed kinases.