Hangzhou, China, June 1st, 2022 -- Hangzhou DAC Biotechnology Co., Ltd. (“DAC Biotechnology”) today announced a collaboration and license agreement with Janssen Biotech, Inc., one of the Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson (“Janssen”). Under the terms of the agreement, DAC Biotechnology will apply its innovative and proprietary antibody drug conjugate (ADC) platform to Janssen’s proprietary antibodies with the aim to develop novel ADC products against up to five targets. The negotiation and finalization of the agreement was facilitated by Johnson & Johnson Innovation. DAC Biotechnology has also received an equity investment from Johnson & Johnson Innovation – JJDC, Inc.
“We are very proud to mark this important collaboration with Janssen,” said Dr. Robert Yongxin Zhao, President and Chief Executive Officer of DAC Biotechnology. “After years of dedicated research and development, DAC technology has become a key player in the field of ADC innovation. Our advanced ADC platform, with abundant reserve of payload/linker pairs, conjugation technologies and CMC capabilities, enables us to build a deep pipeline of products, many of them being first-in-class ADCs. We are committed to bringing safe and efficacious medicines not only to patients in China, but also those around the world.”
“The collaboration with Janssen is the very first collaboration milestone in our global roadmap. The combination of the license agreement and equity investment creates an exciting approach to progressing novel therapeutic innovations in overseas markets,” Dr. Zhao continues.
With the aim to discover novel ADC products via license collaboration, DAC Biotechnology will fully leverage its intellectual properties and proprietary ADC platform, while Janssen will provide its expertise in proprietary antibodies, clinical development and global commercialization. Through the collaboration agreement, DAC Biotechnology is eligible to receive an upfront payment, cost reimbursement and milestone payments, plus royalties on worldwide sales for each selected product.
About DAC Biotechnology
Hangzhou DAC Biotechnology Co., Ltd. is a Chinese high-tech enterprise established in December 2012. The company was founded by several senior scientists who each has more than 20 years of experience in ADC field. DAC Biotechnology has established a broad and differentiated pipeline of 20 ADC drugs in total,5 of which are under clinical development. In March 2021, the company closed Series C financing led by GL Ventures, CDG Capital, and CPE.
The ADC development platform of DAC is built on independent intellectual property rights in connection with more than 50 novel intelligent linkers (including site-specific conjugation) and 100 small molecule cytotoxic drugs, for which DAC owns 28 PCT patents in the ADC field and has applied for more than 400 patents over 21 countries and regions. The platform contains technologies of antibody generation, engineering and production process development, in vitro and in vivo ADC functional evaluation, drug and drug metabolites structure analyses, analytical method development and quality control, etc.
This press release contains “forward-looking” statements within the meaning of federal securities laws. These forward-looking statements are not statements of historical facts and are based on management’s beliefs and assumptions and on information currently available to management. Forward-looking statements include information concerning the terms and development of the Company’s collaboration with Janssen, the Company’s business strategy, activities and financial prospects pursuant to collaboration agreements with third parties, and the design, progression and timing of its clinical trials, the ability of the single-arm UPLIFT cohort to enable registration, the potential benefits of our product candidates, and expectations regarding future clinical trial results based on data achieved to date. Forward-looking statements generally can be identified by terms such as “aims,”“anticipates,” “believes,” “contemplates,” “continues,” “could,” “estimates,” “expects,” “goal,” “intends,” “may,” “on track,” “opportunity,” “plans,” “poised for,” “possible,” “potential,” “predicts,” “projects,” “promises to be,” “seeks,” “should,” “target,” “will,” “would” or similar expressions and the negatives of those terms. Forward-looking statements represent management’s beliefs and assumptions only as of the date of this press release. The Company’s operations involve risks and uncertainties, many of which are outside its control, and any one of which, or combination of which, could materially affect its results of operations and whether the forward-looking statements ultimately prove to be correct. Factors that may materially affect the Company’s results of operations and whether these forward-looking statements prove to be correct include, among other things, that the Company’s partner may not devote sufficient resources to the collaboration, that research, development or commercialization activities conducted pursuant to the Company’s collaboration agreements prove to be unsuccessful, that preclinical testing or early clinical results may not be predictive of the results or success of ongoing or later preclinical or clinical studies, and that the identification, development and testing of the Company’s or its partner’s collaboration.
Except as required by law, the Company assumes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements publicly, or to update the reasons actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future.
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