Building its neuro pipeline, Novartis antes up $210M cash to buy a biotech partner drugging 'both flavors' of NMDA
After J&J and Allergan shone a bright spotlight on the role of NMDA receptors in psychiatric diseases, Novartis has jumped in with both feet by bagging a neuroscience partner.
Cadent Therapeutics is getting $210 million upfront and $560 million in milestones tied to its 3-drug pipeline — with indications spanning schizophrenia and movement disorders.
“The NMDA receptor is one of the most important targets in the brain, it really controls neuronal function, I would describe it as part of the very nuts and bolts of the nervous system,” Gopi Shanker, the interim co-head of neuroscience at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, told Endpoints News. “And so modulation — the right kind of and right amount of modulation — is critical to balancing efficacy and safety and historically it’s been really difficult developing safe and effective modulators of the NMDA receptor.”
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