BRIEF—Magenta exercises new option in Heidelberg agreement

US biotech Magenta Therapeutics has exercised an option in its collaboration with Heidelberg Pharma for the exclusive worldwide development and marketing rights for antibody targeted amanitin conjugated (ATACs) targeting CD45, with the Germany company earning an undisclosed milestone payment in return.

Under the terms of the collaboration, Heidelberg is entitled to receive development and sales-related milestone payments of $85 milliom per selected target.

Pending successful completion of the research phase, Magenta may begin developing ATACs that target CD45.

In March 2018, both companies signed an exclusive multi-target research agreement under which Magenta gained access to Heidelberg Pharma's amanitin toxin-linker platform technology.

Magenta, which can apply Heidelberg’s proprietary ATAC technology to up to four exclusive targets from its antibody portfolio to produce novel ATACs, exercised its first option for the CD117 target in October 2018.