J&J in trio of European deals
Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) announced three deals, including a deal in which Effimune S.A.S. (Nantes, France) granted J&J an exclusive option to FR104, a human mAb CD28 antagonist in preclinical development for autoimmune diseases. Effimune is eligible for undisclosed milestones, plus royalties. Additionally, DCPrime B.V. (Amsterdam, the Netherlands) granted J&J rights to use DCOne technology in feasibility studies to develop a dendritic cell-based vaccine, and J&J partnered with CureVac GmbH (Tuebingen, Germany) to develop an influenza vaccine. The flu vaccine will use J&J's antigen sequences and CureVac's RNActive technology, which includes optimizing mRNA base-pair content, engineering untranslated regions and complexing with protamine, an arginine-rich protein that binds and stabilizes mRNA (see SciBX: Science-Business eXchange, Dec. 20, 2012). ...