Sanofi, Roche discontinue collaborations with Pieris Pharmaceuticals

Pieris Pharmaceuticals (PIRS) disclosed earlier today in its earings release that it recently received notification of Roche’s (RHHBY) intent to discontinue the companies’ research collaboration and license agreement, effective August 21. The Roche collaboration, signed in 2015, pursued the discovery of Anticalin proteins specific for an exploratory immuno-oncology target selected by Roche. Pieris received an upfront payment of approximately $6.4M for the collaboration. Anticalin proteins generated under the collaboration will be wholly owned by the company. Pieris is “currently reviewing the data generated under this collaboration and will consider its strategic options thereafter,” it added. In addition, Pieris said it recently received notification of Sanofi’s (SNY) intent to return to Pieris all rights to the tetraspecific Anticalin program targeting P. aeruginosa, effective August 23. The program originated from a 2010 collaboration from which Pieris received an upfront payment of EUR 3.5M and three milestone payments totaling EUR 1.2M. Sanofi will transfer all related materials, data, and reports to Pieris, who will gain full control over the program. Pieris intends to “review this data package and consider its strategic options thereafter.” The company added, “We remain on track to update investors with data from all three programs before year end. Our lead IO program, PRS-343, continues to advance apace in a dose-escalation study, and we expect to initiate a trial in combination with atezolizumab later this year. For PRS-060, our inhaled IL-4 receptor alpha antagonist program, we successfully completed the single-ascending dose inhalation phase in healthy volunteers and recently initiated a multiple-ascending dose study in subjects with mild asthma to test for early proof of concept via biomarkers.”

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