Amgen is adding Dark Blue to its tapestry, embedding the U.K. biotech’s preclinical blood cancer program into its organization.
The California pharma has stitched together a deal worth up to $840 million for Dark Blue Therapeutics, a private biotech housed in Oxford. The biotech’s aim is to create next-gen precision medicines for cancer.
Through the buyout, Amgen gains Dark Blue's investigational small molecule designed to target and degrade proteins called MLLT 1/3 that can drive certain forms of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). The program is currently in preclinical studies that are used to request entry into human testing, according to the biotech’s online pipeline.
Preclinical leukemia data for the unnamed asset showed “anti-cancer activity and mechanistic differentiation from currently available therapies,” according to a Jan. 6 release announcing the deal.
The small molecule degrader is Dark Blue’s most advanced candidate and is meant to serve as both a monotherapy and combination therapy for patients with AML and solid cancers. The hope is that the program can overcome treatment resistance and improve remission durability.
“Acute myeloid leukemia remains one of the most difficult cancers to treat, and we see an urgent need for new mechanisms capable of changing the trajectory of this disease,” Amgen’s head of R&D, Jay Bradner, M.D., said in the release.
“This acquisition complements and extends our research in targeted protein degradation and leukemia therapeutics, advancing our strategy to invest early in rising medicines for novel therapeutic targets,” he added.
Dark Blue also touts a basket of discovery or earlier-stage protein degraders designed to be first-in-class cancer treatments. The biotech is expected to be woven into Amgen’s existing research organization.
Founded in 2020, Dark Blue was built on a foundation of cancer biology science spun out from the University of Oxford. The company’s CEO is Alastair MacKinnon, co-founder and former chief medical officer of Mereo Biopharma, a London-based biopharma focused on rare disease treatments.