Antares Therapeutics Signs Potential $1.9 Billion Deal with Novartis to Target Undruggable Oncology Proteins
核心洞察
Antares Therapeutics (搜索) entered a strategic collaboration with Novartis valued at up to approximately $1.9 billion to develop small molecule therapies against historically undruggable cancer targets.
Antares will receive $105 million upfront and is eligible for up to $1.8 billion in additional milestone payments plus tiered royalties on global net sales up to the low double-digit range.
The collaboration leverages Antares' proprietary covalent drug discovery platform, including chemical proteomics, computational chemistry, and machine learning capabilities.
Antares Therapeutics (搜索), a Boston-based biotechnology company, announced on June 24 a strategic collaboration with Novartis that could reach up to approximately $1.9 billion in total value, aiming to develop targeted small molecule medicines against oncology targets long considered undruggable.
Under the terms of the agreement, Antares will receive a $105 million upfront payment and is eligible for up to $1.8 billion in additional payments across programs, inclusive of option exercise, development, regulatory, and commercial milestones. The company will also receive tiered royalties on global net sales up to the low double-digit range when any medicines developed under the collaboration reach the market.
A Platform Built for Intractable Targets
The collaboration will harness Antares' proprietary drug discovery engine, which integrates covalent drug discovery expertise with proprietary screening libraries, chemical proteomics capabilities, structure-driven computational chemistry, and a machine-learning suite purpose-built for first-in-class targets. Antares will lead all research efforts and apply its discovery platform to a limited number of historically undruggable targets until option exercise.
"From the outset, our goal has been to build a discovery engine that systematically unlocks high-value, challenging targets and delivers first-in-class precision medicines," said Adam Friedman, M.D., Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of Antares. "This collaboration lets us scale that engine alongside Novartis' world-class development capabilities and global reach, so we can translate our science into transformative therapies for patients faster than either of us could alone."
Novartis Bets on Expanding the Druggable Genome
For Novartis, the partnership represents a strategic commitment to pushing the boundaries of oncology drug discovery. "Many of the most compelling targets today in oncology have historically been considered undruggable," said Fiona Marshall, President of Biomedical Research at Novartis. "We believe this collaboration has the potential to unlock a new wave of targeted therapies and bring meaningful advances to patients."
The deal pairs Antares' early-stage discovery strengths with Novartis' global development and commercial infrastructure, creating a framework designed to accelerate the translation of preclinical discoveries into clinical candidates.
Antares' Trajectory and Pipeline
Antares Therapeutics (搜索) launched in June 2025 as a spin-out of Scorpion Therapeutics (搜索), backed by $177 million in funding. The company's formation followed Scorpion's sale of a drug programme to Eli Lilly in a deal valued at up to $2.5 billion. Alongside the Novartis collaboration, Antares will continue advancing its wholly owned pipeline of precision medicines for cancer and other serious diseases. The company's lead oncology programme is expected to enter human testing in 2026, with several additional programs in earlier stages of laboratory development.