Niagen Bioscience has secured a worldwide exclusive commercial license agreement with Haukeland University Hospital in Bergen, Norway, granting the company exclusive rights to develop and commercialize nicotinamide riboside (Niagen) as a potential treatment for Parkinson's disease. The agreement provides access to proprietary intellectual property, know-how, and clinical data expected to support future regulatory filings under European Medicines Agency guidelines.
Exclusive Rights for NAD+ Therapy Development
With this licensing agreement, Niagen Bioscience becomes the only company authorized to seek regulatory approval for a pharmaceutical nicotinamide riboside therapy for Parkinson's disease patients. The company retains flexibility to either commercialize the drug candidate independently or sublicense the program to a strategic pharmaceutical partner for regulatory advancement and commercialization.
"This milestone underscores our long-term commitment to translating scientific innovation into meaningful therapeutic solutions," stated Rob Fried, CEO of Niagen Bioscience. "Through our partnership with Haukeland and its world-renowned researchers, we are taking bold steps into bringing NAD+-boosting therapies to address clinical unmet needs."
NOPARK Trial Data Foundation
Central to the licensing agreement is access to scientific data from the NOPARK trial, described as the largest and most comprehensive clinical investigation of NAD+ augmentation in persons with early Parkinson's disease to date. The randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase III clinical trial was completed in June 2025 and involved 400 individuals with early-stage Parkinson's disease across 12 sites in Norway.
Study participants were randomized to receive either 500mg of nicotinamide riboside twice daily or placebo for 52 weeks, with follow-up assessments conducted at five time points over the one-year period. The primary endpoint measured the MDS-UPDRS total score, recognized as a gold standard measure of Parkinson's disease progression.
Professor Charalampos Tzoulis, who leads the NOPARK study and the Neuro-SysMed center at Haukeland University Hospital and the University of Bergen, emphasized the significance of the agreement. "This is an important milestone in our efforts to bring a potentially disease-modifying treatment for PD closer to patients," he stated. "We are fully committed to advancing knowledge and developing treatments that can truly benefit patients with PD and other neurodegenerative disorders."
Long-Standing Research Collaboration
The licensing agreement builds upon a longstanding collaboration between Haukeland University Hospital's Dr. Charalampos Tzoulis and Niagen Bioscience's external research program, CERP. The partnership began with material transfer agreements dating to March 2018 and has since supported over 300 research collaborations and more than 35 peer-reviewed clinical studies.
The collaboration has produced four landmark trials assessing the therapeutic potential of Niagen nicotinamide riboside for Parkinson's disease: the phase I/IIa NADPARK study published in Cell Metabolism, the phase I NR-SAFE study published in Nature Communications, the phase IIa N-DOSE study, and the phase III NOPARK study.
Strategic Transition to Drug Development
In connection with the license agreement, Niagen Bioscience has established a wholly-owned subsidiary, representing what the company describes as a pivotal step in its evolution from supplement science to regulated drug development. This transition focuses on pursuing therapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases with high unmet medical needs.
The agreement positions the company to pursue regulatory pathways including Conditional Marketing Authorization, Accelerated Approval, and Marketing Authorization in the European Union under European Medicines Agency guidelines for the potential treatment of Parkinson's disease using its patented nicotinamide riboside molecule.
