Lilly and Biolojic Design Announce Research Collaboration to Discover and Develop Antibody Therapies for Diabetes

March 10, 2021 News /BioonBIOON/ --Eli Lilly(Eli Lilly) recently announced a research collaboration and licensing agreement with Biolojic Design. Biolojic is a biotechnology company dedicated to the computational design of functional antibodies. Under this agreement, Biolojic’s artificial intelligence (AI)-based multispecific platform will be leveraged to discover and develop a potential novel antibody therapy for the treatment ofDiabetes。

Biolojic is dedicated to curing patients by designing and developing transformative, innovative therapies. Powered by artificial intelligence (AI), Biolojic’s technology designs monospecific and multispecific antibodies that precisely target predefined epitopes to execute novel biological programs. By focusing on diseases involving the immune system, Biolojic has developed a portfolio of antibodies aimed at fully unlocking the potential of multiple well-studied biological pathways.

Multi-specific antibodies (multi-specific antibody), or multibodies, are antibodies that, through computational design, can bind to two or more targets on each arm. Fine-tuning the affinity of the two arms for their targets and their respective competitiveness can generate therapeutic agents with varying activities, which differ based on tissue localization and metabolic parameters. The specific targets to be studied under this collaboration agreement have not been disclosed.

Under the terms of the agreement, Eli Lilly will pay for research costs associated with the collaboration; in addition, Biolojic is eligible to receive up to a total of $121 million, including potential development and commercialization milestones, as well as a promissory note convertible into equity in Biolojic at a future date. IfEli LillyUpon successful commercialization of the collaborative therapy, Biolojic will also receive tiered royalties based on low-to-mid single-digit percentages of product sales.

Eli LillyDiabetesRuth Gimeno, Ph.D., Vice President of Metabolic Research, stated: “Eli LillyAs we continue to seek new approaches for novel drug development, Biolojic Design’s multispecific antibody platform represents a promising strategy. We look forward to working closely with Biolojic Design’s scientific team and leveraging their expertise to discover and develop a potential antibody-basedDiabetesTreatment methods."

Dr. Yanay Oran, CEO of Biolojic, stated: “Our AI-powered platform is designed to generate mono- and multispecific antibodies or multibodies. We believe we can precisely target predefined epitopes to potentially execute novel biological programs that were previously unattainable with conventional antibodies. Although our internal pipeline focuses onTumorandAutoimmunityDisease-focused computational antibody design; we are pleased to collaborate with Eli Lilly and apply our platform to design potentialDiabetesTreatment Methods. We withEli Lillyresearch is another example of how our platform enables the reimagining of previously impossible therapies.”(Bioon.com)

Original Source: Eli Lilly and Biolojic Design Announce Research Collaboration to Discover and Develop Antibody Therapies for Diabetes