AbCellera and Kodiak Sciences Enter Second Antibody Discovery Collaboration for Ophthalmology Targets

AbCellera and Kodiak Sciences Inc., announced a new partnership to generate therapeutic antibody candidates in ophthalmology.

Oct. 29, 2020 13:00 UTC

VANCOUVER, British Columbia & PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- AbCellera and Kodiak Sciences Inc. (Nasdaq: KOD), today announced a new partnership to generate therapeutic antibody candidates in ophthalmology. Following a previously successful collaboration, AbCellera will use its full stack, AI-powered antibody discovery technology to discover and identify a large panel of antibodies against new targets designated by Kodiak.

“Kodiak was one of AbCellera’s very first partners, and we are proud to expand our collaboration to support their innovative team in the fight against retinal diseases that cause blindness,” said Carl Hansen, Ph.D., President and CEO of AbCellera. “We are committed to making state-of-the-art antibody discovery broadly available to partners, empowering them to bring new therapies to patients quickly.”

Kodiak develops disruptive products and platforms to prevent and treat the leading causes of blindness. Kodiak’s ABC Platform uses molecular engineering to merge the fields of antibody-based and chemistry-based therapies and is at the core of Kodiak’s discovery engine.

“In our previous work with AbCellera, they delivered quality therapeutic antibody candidates with unique epitope and bioactivity behaviors that were advanced for clinical development. We have been impressed with the growth and power of their platform, both the biology-driven as well as the software-driven aspects. We are delighted to work with their experienced and dedicated team again,” said Victor Perlroth, M.D., CEO of Kodiak Sciences. “The value AbCellera brings to us as a partner is not only their state-of-the-art technology but also their expertise in working with us to discover superior and diverse therapeutic antibody candidates for novel disease targets.”

AbCellera searches, decodes, and analyzes natural immune responses to identify antibodies for next-generation therapeutics. A modern operating system for antibody discovery, the platform integrates patented and proprietary technologies to advance the identification and development of new antibody therapies.

Under the terms of the agreement, AbCellera will receive research and development payments and is eligible for downstream milestone payments, as well as royalties on net sales. Other financial terms were not disclosed.

About Kodiak Sciences Inc.

Kodiak (Nasdaq: KOD) is a biopharmaceutical company committed to researching, developing and commercializing transformative therapeutics to treat high prevalence retinal diseases. Founded in 2009, we are focused on bringing new science to the design and manufacture of next generation retinal medicines to prevent and treat the leading causes of blindness globally. Our ABC Platform™ uses molecular engineering to merge the fields of antibody-based and chemistry-based therapies and is at the core of Kodiak’s discovery engine. Kodiak’s lead product candidate, KSI-301, is a novel anti-VEGF antibody biopolymer conjugate being developed for the treatment of retinal vascular diseases including age-related macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness in elderly patients in the developed world, and diabetic eye diseases, the leading cause of blindness in working-age patients in the developed world. Kodiak has leveraged its ABC Platform to build a pipeline of product candidates in various stages of development including KSI-501, our bispecific anti-IL-6/VEGF biopolymer conjugate for the treatment of neovascular retinal diseases with an inflammatory component, and we are expanding our early research pipeline to include ABC Platform based triplet inhibitors for multifactorial retinal diseases such as dry AMD and glaucoma. Kodiak is based in Palo Alto, CA. For more information, please visit www.kodiak.com.

About AbCellera Biologics Inc.

AbCellera is a privately held technology company with an antibody discovery platform that searches and analyzes natural immune systems to find antibodies that can be used to prevent and treat disease. AbCellera’s technology, which combines high-throughput microfluidics, hyper-scale data science, machine learning, bioinformatics, and genomics, identifies new drug candidates and aims to reduce the time it takes to bring treatments to the clinic. AbCellera’s partners include leading biotechnology companies, global health organizations, and many of the top 10 biopharmaceutical companies. For more information, visit www.abcellera.com.

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Contacts

Kodiak Inquiries
John Borgeson; ir@kodiak.com, +1.650.281.0850 (Kodiak Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)

AbCellera Inquiries
Jessica Yingling; media@abcellera.com, +1.236.521.6774 (AbCellera Media)
Kevin Heyries; bd@abcellera.com, +1.604.559.9005 (AbCellera Business Development)

Source: AbCellera Biologics Inc.