On October 20, 2021 SpringWorks Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: SWTX), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing life-changing medicines for patients with severe rare diseases and cancer, reported that it has entered into a collaboration agreement with Ab Magnitude Ventures Group, LLC and Ab Magnitude Fund, LP (collectively, "Ab Magnitude") for the development of next-generation targeted oncology therapeutics (Press release, SpringWorks Therapeutics, OCT 20, 2021, View Source [SID1234591821]). Ab Magnitude is led by Yibing Shan, Ph.D., a leading structural computational biologist who was a founding member of D.E. Shaw Research, a pioneering computational biochemistry research company. Dr. Shan’s simulations of protein structural dynamics have previously yielded important insights on the activity of key oncogenic proteins and the identification of novel binding sites suitable for small molecule therapies. SpringWorks and Ab Magnitude will collaborate on target discovery and initial hit finding to advance next generation oncology therapeutics. In addition, the parties will also collaborate on a portfolio of novel EGFR inhibitors recently in-licensed by SpringWorks from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute with Ab Magnitude supporting optimization and characterization of the portfolio using its computational platform.
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"We believe that Dr. Shan’s track record of identifying novel druggable targets for the design of new cancer therapies is unparalleled and represents a natural complement to our strategy of developing differentiated targeted therapies on behalf of cancer patients," said Badreddin Edris, Ph.D., Chief Operating Officer of SpringWorks. "We look forward to collaborating with Ab Magnitude and we believe that by incorporating these cutting-edge computational approaches into our early-stage drug discovery and development capabilities, we will be well positioned to continue expanding our emerging preclinical pipeline and advancing promising candidates into the clinic."
"I am excited to collaborate with SpringWorks on discovering novel oncology therapeutics using computational molecular and structural modeling approaches and to further optimizing the portfolio of novel EGFR inhibitors that SpringWorks recently in-licensed," said Dr. Shan. "This collaboration has the potential to expedite discovery of novel oncology therapeutics and advancement of promising therapeutic candidates by integrating Ab Magnitude’s computational modeling and target identification expertise with a vertically-integrated biopharmaceutical partner that has the capital resources and expertise to optimize promising candidates to development candidate stage and into clinical studies."
Under the terms of this agreement, Ab Magnitude is eligible for low single-digit percentage royalties on future net sales of products or other realizations of value arising from the collaboration.