Astellas Pharma Inc., through its wholly-owned subsidiary Universal Cells, Inc., and Adaptimmune Therapeutics plc, have entered into a co-development and co-commercialization agreement to develop new stem-cell derived allogeneic T-cell therapies to treat cancer.

Astellas and Adaptimmune will agree on up to three targets and co-develop T-cell therapy candidates directed to those targets. These targets will exclude target specific T-cell products in preclinical or clinical trials or those developed for other partners at Adaptimmune. The collaboration will leverage Adaptimmune’s target identification and validation capabilities for generating target-specific T-cell Receptors (TCRs), chimeric antigen receptors (CARs), and HLA-independent TCRs that recognize surface epitopes independently of the HLA profile of the tumor cell. The collaboration will also use Astellas’ Universal Donor Cell and Gene Editing Platform. 

Astellas will fund research up until completion of a Phase I trial for each candidate. Astellas and Adaptimmune will elect whether to progress the candidate. The companies will each have a co-exclusive license covering the co-development and co-commercialization of the product candidates within the field of T-cell therapy. If a candidate is developed by one company only, the appropriate licenses will become exclusive to the continuing party.

Adaptimmune is eligible to receive as much as $897.5 million in payments and will receive research funding of up to $7.5 million per year. Adaptimmune would also receive royalties on sales. Astellas may receive up to $552.5 million, as well as royalties on sales.

“Astellas positions immuno-oncology as one of its strategic areas of primary focus, and it is engaged in the development of novel therapies for cancer patients using a new modality/technology,” said Naoki Okamura, Representative Director Corporate Executive Vice President, Chief Strategy Officer and Chief Financial Officer, Astellas. “In addition to NK cells, T-cells are an important component of cell therapy for immuno-oncology, and we look forward that this agreement with Adaptimmune will enable us to create new stem-cell derived allogeneic T-cell therapies for a variety of cancers, including solid tumors, in the future.”

“We are delighted to establish this significant co-development partnership with Astellas, which builds upon and substantially extends an existing collaboration focused on gene editing of iPSC cells,” said Helen Tayton-Martin, Adaptimmune’s Chief Business Officer and Co-Founder. “This new collaboration may encompass both CAR-T and TCR T-cell approaches, including our novel HLA-independent TCR (“HiT”) platform. It brings together highly complementary skills and expertise across the two organizations, and will enable the accelerated development of new, off-the-shelf T-cell therapy products for people with cancer.”