Proteros inks US$167m oncology pact with MSD

Within the R&D collaboration, Proteros biostructures could receive upfront and research funding as well as milestone payments summing up to US$167m (€157m) plus tiered royalties. Under the agreement, Proteros will use its proprietary NEAT and structure-guided discovery platform to select small molecule drug candidates binding to an undisclosed epigenetic cancer target provided by Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., Whitehouse Station, US. 

Torsten Neuefeind, CEO of Proteros, commented: We are pleased to expand our relationship with MSD just one year after starting our first collaboration in epigenetic drug discovery. This new collaboration will benefit from our previous and ongoing work with the team at MSD and we look forward to a further successful partnership, which potentially could transform the treatment of many cancers.

?Proteros is a private biotech company focused on drug discovery for novel and technically demanding targets. One focus is on epigenetic targets. The company is today working for most of the largest pharmaceutical and biotech companies in Europe, US and Japan in collaborative relationships and has further built a pipeline of partnered and proprietary discovery projects with a strong focus on epigenetic targets. Co-founded by Nobel Laureate Robert Huber, Proteros has a strong heritage in structural biology and provides one of the largest and most powerful platforms for structure guided drug discovery.