AbbVie to Collaborate with Caribou Biosciences on CAR-T Cell Therapeutics

AbbVie and Caribou Biosciences, a US-based clinical-stage clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) genome editing biotechnology company, announced on Feb. 10, 2021 that they are entering into a collaboration and license agreement for the research and development of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cell therapeutics.

Under the terms of the agreement, Caribou will receive an upfront cash payment of $40 million and $300 million in future development, regulatory, and launch milestones, Caribou said in a company press release. AbbVie will also obtain access to Caribou’s next-generation Cas12a CRISPR hybrid RNA–DNA genome editing and cell therapy technologies to develop two new CAR-T cell therapies. AbbVie will handle the clinical development, commercialization, and manufacturing of the cell therapies, while Caribou will conduct pre-clinical research, development, and manufacturing of the therapeutics.

“We are excited to partner with AbbVie on the development of new CAR-T cell therapies. This collaboration validates Caribou’s differentiated next-generation CRISPR genome editing technologies that provide best-in-class efficiency and specificity,” said Rachel Haurwitz, PhD, president and CEO of Caribou, in the press release. “We believe AbbVie is an ideal partner for Caribou as we expand upon the number of targets and diseases addressable by our technologies. Genome-edited CAR-T cell therapies hold tremendous potential for patients, and this partnership accelerates our ability to address significant unmet medical need.”

“CAR-T therapies have shown to be a promising breakthrough in cancer treatment,” added Steve Davidsen, PhD, vice-president, Oncology Discovery, AbbVie, in the press release. “Collaborating with Caribou and their cutting-edge CRISPR platform will help AbbVie advance our efforts to deliver new hope for patients.”

Source: Caribou