With more than $1.5 billion on the line, Gilead looks to bolster its CAR T portfolio.
Even as many big pharma companies are retreating from cell therapies, Gilead subsidiary Kite Pharma has entered a global licensing agreement with Chinese biotech Pregene.
Under the terms of the deal, Gilead will put down $120 million in an upfront payment and will promise up to $1.52 billion in milestones, according to an automated translation of a Chinese-language regulatory filing on Thursday. Pregene will also be entitled to royalties on product sales.
A Kite spokesperson confirmed the collaboration to Fierce Biotech, noting that the partnership “enables us to advance clinical proof-of-concept studies for in vivo therapy more quickly by integrating complementary technologies and expertise.” The companies did not disclose project timelines, target indications or the division of obligations under the collaboration.
With its Pregene partnership, Kite follows in the footsteps of Bristol Myers Squibb, which last week made a similarly hefty investment in cell therapy with its $1.5 billion acquisition of Orbital Therapeutics. The purchase gives BMS a pipeline of RNA therapies that can reprogram the immune system in vivo, which the pharma said will support its CAR T portfolio.
Kite in August likewise made a cell therapy acquisition, dropping $350 million for Interius BioTherapeutics and its drug development platform for in vivo CAR T therapies.
Both BMS and Gilead are leaders in the CAR T space. BMS owns the anti-CD19 Breyanzi for multiple hematological malignancies and the BCMA-targeting Abecma, indicated for relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma. Gilead, meanwhile, markets Yescarta and Tecartus, both targeting CD19 for different blood cancers.
By contrast, other big pharma players have decided to withdraw from cell therapies. Earlier this month, for instance, Takeda announced that it would no longer invest in this modality and will search for a partner to take its assets and technologies forward. This move cost 137 people their jobs. A few days later, Novo Nordisk also revealed its exit from the cell therapy space as part of new CEO Maziar Mike Doustdar’s restructuring initiative.
Kite’s agreement with Pregene on Thursday continues an industry trend of looking to China for novel therapies. According to an August analysis from IQVIA, biopharma pumped as much as $48.5 billion into Chinese collaborations in the first half of 2025, already eclipsing the $44.8 billion total investment made last year. Among these deals are Pfizer’s agreement with 3SBio in May, which involved a $1.25 billion upfront commitment and up to $4.8 billion in milestones, and AstraZeneca’s $5.3 billion partnership with CSPC in June.
