Takeda puts $120M in near-term cash on the table to complete a new oncology platform deal
Takeda is spending big to add a new piece to their oncology R&D puzzle.
This morning the global pharma company picked up an alliance with Turnstone Biologics, which has been building a new viral immunotherapy platform to complement its work on oncolytics, partnered with AbbVie for the past 2 years.
Dubbed the vaccinia virus platform out of a lab in Ottawa, R&D chief Mike Burgess describes it as a “highly selective virus as a consequence of engineering, exquisitely selective for cancer cells in contrast to normal cells.” And it can be used to deliver a payload of transgenes for Flt3 ligand, anti-CTLA-4 antibody, and IL-12 cytokine that replicate in cells.
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