Friday, May 30, 2008

Takeda to license Alnylam's RNAi drugs

Japanese drug maker Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. has expanded its efforts to become a huge player in the Cambridge life sciences space, with a new deal worth up to $1 billion to license RNAi drugs from Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc.

The deal comes a month and a half after Takeda announced that it would acquire Cambridge biotech firm Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc. in a landmark deal valued at $8.8 billion, showing that Takeda is rapidly hitching its future in the oncology market to science and products made in Massachusetts. Takeda completed its buyout of Millennium earlier this month.

The Alnylam deal gives Takeda the right to be the first company to negotiate development and commercialization agreements on Cambridge-based Alnylam’s RNA-interference drugs for the Asian market (except for ALN-RSV01, an experimental treatment for respiratory syncytial virus) for five years. It also enables Alnylam the option to be the U.S. commercial partner of Takeda-developed RNAi treatments.

RNAi drugs are designed to inhibit the expression of certain genes linked to diseases. Alnylam’s leadership in the field has brought it other large deals with big drug companies such as Swiss pharma giant Roche Holding AG, which has research and development operations in Cambridge. 

Takeda has agreed to pay Alnylam $100 million in initial fees and $50 million soon in technology-transfer and licensing payments to access Alnylam RNAi technology for the fields of oncology and metabolic diseases, and additional R&D and milestone sums could make the deal worth up to $1 billion to Alnylam, according to the companies. The firms also said that Takeda has the option to expand the deal into additional therapeutic areas for $50 million per field.

With its nearly $9 billion sale closed, Millennium is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Takeda and will continue operations in Cambridge as a standalone business unit, keeping the Millennium name. Takeda also decided to keep Millennium’s executive team in place: Millennium CEO Deborah Dunsire is president of the subsidiary and reports directly to Takeda President Yasuchika Hasegawa.

Massachusetts isn’t the only region of the United States on Takeda’s radar, however. In April, South San Francisco, Calif.-based Cell Genesys Inc. agreed to sell worldwide commercial rights for its experimental prostate cancer treatment to Takeda in a deal that could be worth up to $270 million. Takeda agreed to make an initial $50 million payment followed by future payments if the drug is approved for sale and achieves revenue goals.