After Pfizer’s venture arm co-led Enodia Therapeutics’ $25 million seed round in January, the pharma has signed up to collaborate with the biotech on small-molecule drugs to eliminate pathogenic proteins where they’re being made.
Pfizer is putting more than half a billion dollars on the line to partner with Paris-based Enodia Therapeutics on small-molecule drugs that can destroy pathologic proteins before they manifest as diseases.
The companies did not disclose specific financial details of the agreement in their Tuesday morning release. But all told, the deal could top $500 million in value, a sum that covers an upfront commitment from Pfizer plus research, development and sales milestones. Enodia will also be entitled to certain tiered royalties on net sales.
For its investment, Pfizer will get access to Enodia’s proprietary technology to develop small-molecule drugs that target Sec61, a membrane protein complex involved in the processing of newly made proteins and linked to a wide range of conditions, from kidney and liver diseases to cancer and even diabetes. The partners haven’t specified what specific conditions they plan to address. BioSpace has reached out to the companies for more details.
Enodia will be responsible for screening, optimizing and developing Sec61 inhibitor candidates, while Pfizer will take charge of clinical studies, as well as manufacturing, regulatory and commercial activities.
Launched in February 2025 by Argobio and The Institut Pasteur, Enodia’s work focuses on targeting Sec61 through a machine learning–driven design engine that draws from comprehensive biological libraries, according to the biotech’s website. This approach yields small-molecule drug candidates that can trigger the destruction of pathologic proteins at the point of synthesis—before they can exert their disease-causing effects.
Enodia’s approach enables the drugmaker “to inhibit disease-driving proteins while preserving essential physiological functions,” CEO Yves Ribeill said in a prepared statement on Tuesday.
Enodia is not the only biotech targeting the Sec61 secretory channel. Gate Bioscience, which last week drew another big investment in the form of a deal expansion with Eli Lilly, is also in the business of developing small-molecule drugs that eliminate target proteins by blocking their progress through Sec61.
Pfizer is an early believer in Enodia’s approach. The pharma’s venture arm co-led Enodia’s seed round in January, helping the biotech raise €20.7 million ($25 million). Founders Argobio and The Institut Pasteur also participated in the financing, alongside several other investment groups.
A few weeks after the funding push, Enodia paid $1 million upfront to acquire a clutch of Sec61-targeting preclinical assets from Kezar Life Sciences—a deal designed to improve Enodia’s “understanding of Sec61 selectivity mechanisms.” Under the terms of this agreement, Enodia is on the hook for up to $127 million in development, regulatory and commercialization milestones.
For Pfizer, the Enodia deal comes amid a sweeping restructuring effort. The pharma launched its cost-cutting program in October 2023 and has since continued to raise its savings target. Most recently, Pfizer in August added $2.5 billion to its cost cuts, largely from “technology and simplification efforts,” the company said during its Q2 report at the time. These cuts are slated to run from 2027 through 2029.
During that quarterly call, CEO Albert Bourla doubled down on the pharma’s $7-billion budget for M&A—an amount that analysts found a little low considering the spike in Big Pharma’s dealmaking activity this year.
The company has spent some $80 billion on deals since 2022, Bourla said during the call. “Pfizer has placed the business development bets already. And we are executing on that.”
