Drugmaker AstraZeneca has struck a deal with Ionis Pharmaceuticals that will see the pair work together to develop and commercialise its investigational medicine Eplontersen.
AstraZeneca said on Tuesday that the duo will jointly develop and commercialise Eplontersen in the US, while AstraZeneca will develop and commercialise it in the rest of the world, except in Latin America.
The FTSE 100-listed firm will pay Ionis an upfront payment of $200.0m and additional conditional payments of up to $485.0m following regulatory approvals. It will also pay up to $2.9bn of sales-related milestones based on thresholds between $500.0m and $6.0bn, plus royalties in the range of “low double-digit to mid-twenties percentage”, depending on the region.
AstraZeneca stated the transaction, expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2021, would be funded with cash and was expected to be neutral to core earnings in 2021.
As of 0810 GMT, AstraZeneca shares were down 0.82% at 8,294.64p.
