Codexis, Inc. has signed a CodeEvolver platform agreement with Novartis under which Codexis has granted a non-exclusive license to its CodeEvolver protein engineering platform technology to Novartis to develop performance enzymes for use in manufacturing pharmaceutical products. Upon completion of the technology transfer, the CodeEvolver protein engineering platform will be located at a Novartis site.
 
Novartis will pay Codexis an upfront payment, milestone payments upon the satisfactory completion of technology transfer and payments for improvements to the CodeEvolver platform technology. Also, Codexis will be eligible to receive payments for active pharmaceutical ingredients manufactured with enzymes developed by Novartis using the CodeEvolver technology. Codexis also receives certain rights for future purchases of enzymes developed and sourced by Novartis using the CodeEvolver technology.
 
“Novartis has been a highly valued Codexis customer for nearly a decade, and we’ve been very pleased to see the accelerating and widening of our R&D collaborations together especially over the past several years. Taking this next step to bring our CodeEvolver^® technology in-house, Novartis is the latest leading pharmaceutical company to validate the very wide applicability of enzymatic catalysis across its extensive small molecule drug pipeline,” said Codexis president and chief executive officer, John Nicols. “We look forward to serving and deepening our relationship with Novartis in this new chapter from here.”