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26 February 2018Americas

Kite teams up with Sangamo to treat cancer

Kite Pharma has entered into a collaboration with Sangamo Therapeutics that will see the companies develop next-generation engineered cell therapies to treat cancer.

California-based Kite is a subsidiary of Gilead that focuses on the development of innovative cancer immunotherapies.

Sangamo, also based in California, creates genome editing, gene therapy, gene regulation and cell therapy platforms used in the treatment of cancer patients.

Under the partnership, Kite will use Sangamo’s technology platform covering zinc finger nucleases to develop next-generation ex vivo cell therapies for autologous and allogeneic use to treat different cancers.

According to a press release, allogeneic cell therapies from healthy donor cells provide a treatment option that can be accessed directly within the oncology infusion centre. As a result, the infusion time for patients can be reduced.

As part of the agreement, Sangamo will receive an upfront payment of $150 million. Furthermore, it is eligible to receive up to $3 billion in potential payments, and will receive tiered royalties on sales of any future products that result from the partnership.

Kite will develop, manufacture and commercialise all of the products that form part of the collaboration. It will also be responsible for agreed-on expenses incurred by Sangamo.

Sandy Macrae, president and CEO of Sangamo, said that the collaboration will bring together two leading platforms to develop “best-in-class” cell therapies in oncology.

“We are excited by Kite’s commitment to driving innovation in this field and look forward to working together to realise the full promise of cell therapy in treating cancer,” she said.

John Milligan, president and CEO of Gilead, added that the emergence of gene editing as a tool to edit immune cells is promising for the development of therapies.

He said: “We believe Sangamo’s zinc finger nucleases provide the optimal gene editing platform, and we look forward to working with Sangamo to accelerate our efforts to develop next-generation autologous cell therapies, as well as allogeneic treatments that can be accessed more conveniently in the hospital setting for people living with cancer.”

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More on this story

Americas
12 December 2017   Gilead Sciences has built on its acquisition of cell therapy company Kite Pharma with another purchase.
Americas
5 September 2017   Juno Therapeutics and the Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research have entered a second round of litigation against Kite, a company which specialises in cancer immunotherapy treatments.
Americas
25 July 2018   California-based Sangamo Therapeutics has acquired biotech company TxCell for approximately €72 million.

More on this story

Americas
12 December 2017   Gilead Sciences has built on its acquisition of cell therapy company Kite Pharma with another purchase.
Americas
5 September 2017   Juno Therapeutics and the Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research have entered a second round of litigation against Kite, a company which specialises in cancer immunotherapy treatments.
Americas
25 July 2018   California-based Sangamo Therapeutics has acquired biotech company TxCell for approximately €72 million.