Daiichi Sankyo partners with Merck and Pfizer

Japan’s Daiichi Sankyo (TYO: 4568) has entered into a clinical trial collaboration agreement with Germany’s Merck KGaA (MRK: DE) and US pharma giant Pfizer (NYSE: PFE).

The companies will evaluate the combination of [fam-] trastuzumab deruxtecan (DS-8201), an investigational HER2 targeting antibody drug conjugate (ADC), in combination with the checkpoint inhibitor avelumab and/or an investigational Merck DNA damage response (DDR) inhibitor, in patients with HER2 expressing or mutated solid tumors.

A separate research collaboration to conduct preclinical studies evaluating [fam-] trastuzumab deruxtecan in combination with avelumab, the DDR inhibitor and other investigational compounds in Merck and Pfizer's pipelines is also underway.