Boehringer Ingelheim (Boehringer) and 3T Biosciences (3T) have entered into a strategic collaboration and licensing agreement to discover and develop next-generation cancer therapies to address high unmet patient needs, the companies announced.
The partnership will see Boehringer input its patient-derived T-cell receptor (TCR) data into 3T’s discovery platform, 3T TRACE, with the aim of identifying novel antigen targets for cancer immunotherapies.
The immunotherapy company’s platform is designed to improve the identification of novel shared TCR targets and screening of TCRs by combining high-diversity target libraries with active machine learning, potentially leading to tumour-specific, safer therapies that can be delivered at higher doses.
“3T’s 3T-TRACE discovery platform has the potential to transform the treatment of cancers and beyond,” said 3T’s president and chief executive officer, Stefan Scherer. “By using data from patients for patients we aim to discover the best immunogenic targets for multiple tumour indications and across patient populations.”
Under the terms of the agreement, 3T will receive an upfront payment and research and development support from Boehringer and will be eligible to receive up to $268m in discovery, preclinical, clinical, regulatory and commercial milestones, as well as royalties on future product sales. Boehringer will also be eligible to receive royalties on future product sales by 3T arising from the agreement.
Lamine Mbow, global head of cancer immunology and immune modulation at Boehringer, said: “Through our new partnership with 3T, we aim to accelerate and expand our pipeline of first-in-class T-cell based therapies for patients affected by cancer.”
When 3T announced its launch in August 2022, the company said it had exclusively in-licenced a precise antibody-based peptide-HLA therapeutic discovery platform, along with development-stage MAGE-A3 TCR-T assets from Stanford University to rapidly expand its therapeutic portfolio.
“The combination of the TCR-mimetic discovery platform with the 3T-TRACE platform uniquely positions 3T to rapidly generate therapeutics targeting pHLA targets that are devoid of off-target cross-reactivity targeting,” Scherer said at the time of the announcement.