Eye­ing a po­ten­tial mar­ket launch, Astel­las or­ders up a $95M third course of Cy­to­ki­net­ics’ pipeline

What­ev­er Astel­las learned about Cy­to­ki­net­ics $CYTK in the three years since first sign­ing on as a col­lab­o­ra­tor, the ex­pe­ri­ence must have giv­en its re­search team plen­ty of con­fi­dence in the biotech’s fu­ture. Astel­las is an­nounc­ing to­day that it’s com­ing back for a big­ger share of the pipeline, its third big por­tion of Cy­to­ki­net­ics’ tech­nol­o­gy and mus­cle ac­ti­va­tion ther­a­peu­tics.

Astel­las is com­mit­ting $95 mil­lion in the deal. That cov­ers $65 mil­lion up front in ex­change for an op­tion on the de­vel­op­ment and com­mer­cial­iza­tion of tirasem­tiv, Cy­to­ki­net­ics’ lead mus­cle drug now in late-stage de­vel­op­ment, for amy­otroph­ic lat­er­al scle­ro­sis (ALS). And there’s an­oth­er $30 mil­lion to pay for a mid-stage ALS study for an­oth­er mus­cle ac­ti­va­tor in the pipeline, CK-2127107. If Astel­las picks up its op­tion, Cy­to­ki­net­ics can gain a to­tal of more than $100 mil­lion in the deal.

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