Evotec, J&J partner for Alzheimer's disease
Evotec AG (Xetra:EVT) partnered with the Janssen Biotech Inc. subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) to identify new targets and compounds to treat Alzheimer's disease. Under the TargetAD collaboration, Janssen will fund Evotec's research costs and will have the exclusive option to license targets and compounds from Evotec's TargetAD database. The database comprises potential AD drug targets derived from an analysis of dysregulated genes in human brain tissues across all disease stages. Janssen will reimburse Evotec up to $10 million total for its full time employee-based research costs. Evotec is also eligible for up to $145 million in milestones per program, plus royalties.
The deal came out of J&J's California Innovation Center, which debuted in June; Evotec has a research center in San Francisco, Calif. The J&J center, which will help provide joint R&D support for the deal, is one of the four regional centers the pharma is establishing to make early stage deals and investments across its pharma, medical devices and consumer businesses (see BioCentury, July 22). ...