The UK biopharma company Alchemab Therapeutics announced today that it has joined forces with Eli Lilly to discover, develop, and commercialize up to five novel therapeutics for the treatment of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
The companies will work with Alchemab’s antibody discovery platform, which uses samples from patients whose disease progresses much slower than normal. Based on these patient samples, Alchemab’s platform – with the help of data mining and machine learning models – can identify antibodies associated with greater resilience to the disease.
“We have shown that our novel, differentiated antibody discovery platform can lead to insights into how an individual’s immune response can generate potent, selective, and unique antibodies with therapeutic potential,” said Jane Osbourn, CEO of Alchemab in a press release. “Guided by patients’ biological response to disease, Alchemab’s platform yields both novel targets and potential therapies in one process.”
Also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, ALS is a progressive neurological disorder that causes the motor neurons in the brain and spinal cord to degenerate and die. This disrupts the signals from the brain to the muscles, resulting in muscle atrophy. Symptoms include twitching, cramps, stiffness, and weakness of the muscles, as well as difficulties speaking, chewing, or swallowing. Eventually, people with ALS lose their ability to breathe. Although several drugs are approved for ALS, none of them stop or reverse the progression of the disease.
“ALS is a devastating disease and an area of significant unmet medical need,” said Osbourn. “Our collaboration with Lilly enables us to apply our novel approach to a hugely important disease in partnership with one of the most respected names in pharma. We are looking forward to working together to discover and develop novel targets and therapies for ALS patients.”
Under the terms of the agreement, Alchemab will work together with Lilly on up to five novel therapeutics, taking them from discovery and development through to commercialization. Alchemab will receive an undisclosed upfront payment and will be eligible for milestone and royalty payments.
The ALS field is seeing investments from biotech and pharma companies, such as the recent $480 million ALS deal between Mitsubishi and Dewpoint.
However, it has also experienced a number of failures. Just this week, the U.S. company Denali Therapeutics published topline results from its Phase 2/3 ALS Platform Trial, revealing that the study had failed to meet the primary efficacy endpoint of slowing disease progression compared to placebo.
