PeptiDream expands radioligand deal with Novartis

Japanese biotech PeptiDream (TYO: 4587) edged up 3% to 2,081 yen today, after it announced an expansion of its peptide discovery collaboration with Swiss pharma giant Novartis (NOVN: VX).

Under the multi-program agreement, PeptiDream will use its proprietary Peptide Discovery Platform System (PDPS) technology to identify and optimize novel macrocyclic peptides against targets selected by Novartis, for potential conjugation to radionuclides (to which Novartis refers to as “radioligand therapies” or RLTs) or other applications for both therapeutic and diagnostic purposes.

This new agreement expands on the peptide-drug conjugate (PDC) collaboration announced in 2019, and further highlights the two companies’ long-standing discovery efforts, originally initiated in 2010, and extended multiple times, including Novartis’s licensing of PeptiDream’s PDPS technology in 2015, PeptiDream explained.