Cel­gene inks first deals since Bris­tol-My­ers an­nounced $74B buy­out — bets $80M on im­munome­tab­o­lism

Cel­gene may be busy wrap­ping up the biggest deal in its ex­is­tence — the pro­posed $74 bil­lion sale to Bris­tol-My­ers Squibb — but it’s still snap­ping up op­tions to nascent im­muno-on­col­o­gy drugs while it can.

The lat­est tie-up in­volves Kyn Ther­a­peu­tics, a Boston start­up backed by At­las Ven­ture and Or­biMed to go af­ter metabo­lites that keep the im­mune sys­tem from at­tack­ing can­cer. For $80 mil­lion up­front and an undis­closed eq­ui­ty in­vest­ment, Cel­gene ob­tains ex­clu­sive op­tions to two of these im­munome­tab­o­lism ther­a­pies — which they will make a de­ci­sion about once Kyn is done with the Phase Ib.

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