As BioNTech’s pipeline tilts back toward oncology, the German biotech is once again tapping a young Chinese partner in a bid for the next generation of the field’s hottest modality.
It’s going back to MediLink Therapeutics for antibody-drug conjugates in a new deal that begins with $25 million and promises up to $1.8 billion down the road, plus tiered royalties should any of the ADCs make it to market. For that money, BioNTech snags the exclusive option for the global license to MediLink’s so-called TMALIN ADC platform for “several novel targets,” the companies said over the weekend.
The deal arrives less than 12 months after BioNTech originally paired up with the Suzhou-headquartered biotech, which also has R&D locations in Shanghai and Boston. The duo is in Phase 2 testing for their first partnered asset, a HER3-targeted ADC known as BNT326 or YL202. Also in the HER3 space is ADC pioneer Daiichi Sankyo, which awaits an FDA approval decision on its Merck-allied ADC patritumab deruxtecan next month.
Drugmakers across the board are trying to get their hands on the next wave of ADCs, a type of targeted cancer medicine that has been around for more than two decades but has only more recently gained momentum thanks to improvements in chemistry, payload technology and other pieces of the R&D puzzle. About a dozen ADCs have now been approved, and nearly every pharma has made acquisitions or inked collaborations in the space. Fledgling startups are also bagging megarounds to prove their own ways.
MediLink itself has been quite active on the partnering front. It’s in the clinic with Roche, Zai Lab, Harbour and Henlius.
BioNTech’s ADC pipeline also includes the Duality Bio-partnered assets BNT323, BNT324 and BNT325, which go after HER2, B7H3 and TROP2, respectively. Last November, BioNTech CEO Uğur Şahin said the company was partnering and acquiring clinical-stage ADCs while also working on a preclinical in-house pipeline that it expects will enter human studies beginning in 2025, according to an innovation day transcript from AlphaSense.
The biotech, which became famous for its Pfizer-partnered Covid-19 vaccine, now counts most of its high-profile ambitions in cancer. It is also working on mRNA drugs, cell therapies, vaccines, checkpoint inhibitors and other types of cancer medicines.
Meanwhile, it’s maintaining an infectious disease pipeline targeting flu, malaria, mpox and shingles, among other earlier-stage projects.