Magenta Therapeutics exercises ATAC licence option

Stem cell specialist Magenta Therapeutics (Cambridge, MA, USA) agreed to pay up to $85m in milestones for the rights to exclusively develop and market Heidelberg Pharma’s CD45-ATAC. Heidelberg Pharma’s US partner did not disclosed the amount of the upfront payment. Pending successful completion of the research phase, Magenta may begin developing ATACs that target CD45.

The collaboration agreement of Heidelberg Pharma and Magenta Therapeutics go back to March 2018. The exclusive multi-target research agreement allowed Magenta to gain access to Heidelberg Pharma's Amanitin toxin-linker platform technology. Magenta may apply Heidelberg Pharma's proprietary ATAC technology to up to four exclusive targets from its antibody portfolio to produce novel ATACs. Magenta exercised its first option for the CD117 target in October 2018.

CD45 is a surface protein expressed by immune cells and hematopoietic stem cells. An ATAC for CD45 could provide a one-time curative therapy for patients with autoimmune diseases by removing the disease-causing cells, resetting the immune system and allowing the body to rebuild a healthy new immune system.