Nabla Bio, a biotechnology company focused on de novo therapeutics design using generative AI, announced a new, multi-year research collaboration on Tuesday with Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (NYSE:TAK).
Under the terms of the agreement, Nabla Bio will receive double-digit millions in upfront and research cost payments and is eligible to receive success-based payments that may exceed $1 billion.
This second collaboration will deploy Nabla Bio's biomolecular design platform, Joint Atomic Model (JAM), across Takeda's early-stage development programs.
The new collaboration will include de novo design of antibodies in parallel for multiple targets, multispecifics, challenging targets, and other custom therapeutics.
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"Since 2022, we've collaborated with Takeda to push the boundaries of next-generation biologics discovery," said Surge Biswas, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of Nabla Bio.
Nabla Bio is founded on the tight integration of generative AI and human-relevant in vitro and in vivo testing. JAM has demonstrated double-digit success rates in de novo design across various targets, including generating picomolar binders to challenging target classes such as G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) in a true zero-shot setting.
Coupled with direct-to-function testing, JAM has delivered functional antibodies such as GPCR agonists and complex biologics, like multispecifics and receptor decoys.
Nabla's AI-designed therapeutics demonstrate preclinical properties, including function, pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics, and low immunogenicity in non-human primates.
Reuters notes that the shift highlights rising momentum in the pharmaceutical sector to leverage AI for faster and cheaper drug development.
Nabla CEO Surge Biswas likened JAM to ChatGPT for molecules, explaining that it designs antibodies from scratch to bind targets with specific properties.
CEO Biswas told Reuters that it is focused on Takeda's most pressing discovery challenges and leveraging JAM to remove obstacles and accelerate progress.
TAK Price Action: Takeda shares are up 0.33% at $13.77 at the time of publication on Tuesday. The stock is trading 7.5% above its 52-week low but is still 7.2% below its 50-day moving average.
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