AbbVie, Calico Extend Partnership for Age-Related Disease Therapies

AbbVie and Calico Life Sciences recently extended their collaboration to discover, develop, and bring new therapies to market for patients with age-related diseases, including neurodegeneration and cancer. 

Calico Life Sciences, founded by Alphabet, has an established research and development facility with over 200 employees in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

As part of the collaboration, Calico will pursue discovery-stage research and development utilizing technology and advanced computing capabilities. AbbVie will provide scientific and clinical development support and provide expertise for future commercialization activities. 

"Our collaboration has evolved into an innovation engine, particularly for novel targets in the oncology and immuno-oncology space, that could break new ground for challenging, age-related diseases," Tom Hudson, MD, senior vice president of research and development and chief scientific officer at AbbVie, said in the announcement. 

In 2014, AbbVie and Calico Life Sciences partnered to discover therapies for age-related diseases. At the time, both companies committed $250 million to fund the collaboration. 

Since then, the collaboration has produced over 20 early-stage programs addressing disease states across immuno-oncology and neurodegeneration and has developed new insights into the biology of aging.

Additionally, the companies have advanced three neurodegeneration and cancer targets into the clinic. One immuno-oncology target with two PTPN2 inhibitors is currently in Phase 1 studies.

"Our three clinical initiatives and more than 20 discovery and preclinical programs to date are clear evidence of how productive a partnership we've established," said Aarif Khakoo, MD, head of research and development at Calico. 

"This additional extension validates our original vision and is a testament to the collective efforts of many people from both organizations who are working to deepen our understanding of specific disease pathways and develop novel therapies for patients,” Khakoo continued. 

Under the extended agreement, both companies will contribute an additional $500 million to the collaboration and share costs and profits equally. The collaboration will extend into 2022. 

Calico will be responsible for research and early development until 2025 and will boost collaboration projects into Phase 2a through 2030. AbbVie will support Calico in its early research and development efforts and will have the option to manage late-stage development and commercial activities.

"The extension of this collaboration enables Calico's world-class scientists and the AbbVie Discovery team to continue to build on the transformative research we've done and advance more preclinical and clinical programs that have first-in-class potential," Gerry Fox, PhD, vice president of discovery at AbbVie, concluded.