Seattle’s Alpine Immune Sciences inks deal worth up to $535 Million with Kite Pharma
Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Young Seattle immunotherapy biotech company Alpine Immune Sciences Inc. has landed its first collaboration deal, and it's a big one.
Alpine announced Tuesday that it is teaming up with Santa Monica, California-based immunotherapy biotech Kite Pharma Inc. (Nasdaq: KITE) to discover and develop immunotherapy treatments for cancer.
Through a worldwide research and license agreement, Alpine will grant Kite an executive license to two of its technology programs.
Under the terms of the partnership, Kite will make an upfront payment of $5 million to Alpine.
Alpine will also be eligible to receive milestone payments based upon the successful achievement of research, clinical and regulatory milestones totaling $530 million plus royalty payments on product sales.
Alpine was founded in January, comprised of several scientists from Amgen, which will shutter its Washington state operations by the end of this year. Alpine raised about $2.6 million earlier this year.
Mitch Gold, CEO of Alpine, said that he specifically wanted to team up with Kite over other firms.
"Kite is unique in this field because they have a unique understanding of the biology of cancer," he said, "and where the field is going."
Immunotherapy involves engineering a patient's cells to boost the immune system to better battle disease. Many have heralded the field as the next great promise in cancer treatment.
There are many companies and nonprofits in the Puget Sound region that focus on immunotherapy, including Seattle biotech Juno Therapeutics.
Gold also said that Alpine will be "hiring aggressively" through the end of this year and into 2016, but wouldn't specify how many people are on staff.
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