Ginkgo Bioworks inks $144 million deal with Merck

11 October 2022

Shares of Ginkgo Bioworks (NYSE: DNA) were down 3.6% at $2.78 today, despite the company announcing a deal with US pharma giant Merck & Co (NYSE: MRK) to engineer a crucial component of up to four enzymes for use as biocatalysts in Merck's active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) manufacturing efforts.

Through this collaboration, Ginkgo will leverage its extensive experience in cell engineering and enzyme design, as well as its capabilities in automated high throughput screening, manufacturing process development/optimization, bioinformatics and analytics to deliver optimal strains for expression of targeted biocatalysts.

Under the terms of the collaboration, Ginkgo will earn an upfront research and development fee and is eligible for success-based research and development milestone payments. In addition, Ginkgo is eligible to earn commercial milestone payments for each of a specified number of biocatalysis targets, which have the potential to total, in the aggregate, up to $144 million.

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