The ink was barely dry on AstraZeneca’s announcement of a landmark investment in its Chinese capabilities before the U.K.-based pharma agreed to pay more than $1 billion to one of its regional partners.
AstraZeneca is handing $1.2 billion in upfront cash to CSPC Pharmaceuticals for the ex-China rights to the biopharma’s once-monthly injectable weight management portfolio of eight programs. These are headed up by SYH2082, a long-acting GLP1R/GIPR agonist that is being readied for phase 1 trials.
Alongside SYH2082, the companies will also focus on another three programs that AstraZeneca described as showcasing “differing mechanisms designed to provide extended therapeutic benefits for people living with obesity and weight-related conditions.” CSPC is tasked with taking these assets through to the completion of a successful phase 1 study, before AstraZeneca picks up the baton for further development and—hopefully—on to commercialization outside of greater China.
In return for the ex-China rights to all eight programs as well as use of CSPC’s artificial intelligence molecular design capabilities and LiquidGel once-monthly dosing platform technology, AstraZeneca is making the $1.2 billion upfront payment, with the potential for a further $3.5 billion to follow in development and milestone payments across all programs.
According to CSPC's filing with the Hong Kong stock exchange, the company could also receive up to an additional $13.8 billion in sales milestones.
While CSPC will keep the rights to these drugs in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau, AstraZeneca has the option to co-commercialize these products in the region.
Today’s deal also leaves AstraZeneca with the option to “pursue future metabolic programmes” that use CSPC’s dosing platform, including deploying the tech across AstraZeneca’s own pipeline, according to the Jan. 30 release.
“This could help improve treatment adherence and support strong patient preference for once-monthly regimens,” the pharma noted.
“This strategic collaboration advances our weight management portfolio by delivering novel assets which complement our existing programmes,” Sharon Barr, Ph.D., AstraZeneca’s head of biopharmaceuticals R&D, said in a statement.
“It will provide access to CSPC’s proprietary AI-enabled peptide capabilities and platform technology, which have the potential to transform the treatment of obesity, helping to address adherence and convenience as key barriers to long-term therapeutic success,” Barr said.
“This is an important step in creating a portfolio of simple, scalable and sustainable options that can help people with obesity, and weight-related complications live better, healthier lives,” she added.
The deal with CSPC comes just one day after AstraZeneca committed to spend $15 billion in China through 2030. In that announcement, the pharma—which already has a large presence in China—name-checked CSPC as one of the “leading biotechs” in the country that would benefit from AstraZeneca’s investments.
The two companies already have a detailed backstory, with AstraZeneca paying CSPC $100 million for a preclinical cardiovascular disease drug in 2024 and then $110 million last year to collaborate on finding new oral drugs for a range of chronic diseases.
CSPC’s chairman Dongchen Cai said the Shijiazhuang-based company was “very excited to further expand and strengthen our strategic partnership with AstraZeneca into the area of weight management.”
“We hope this win-win collaboration will deliver the next generation of treatments that build upon the emerging science, using our technology platforms and AstraZeneca’s complementary capabilities and reach, to realise global health benefits for people in need of improved weight management,” Cai added.
AstraZeneca said the latest deal would complement its own obesity pipeline, which includes phase 2-stage assets like the oral GLP-1 drug elecoglipron and the injectable selective amylin receptor agonist AZD6234.
There’s been no slow-up in the pace of obesity dealmaking in recent months, with Eli Lilly penning an oral weight loss drug pact with Nimbus Therapeutics, Pfizer buying GLP-1 drugs from a Fosun Pharmaceutical subsidiary and Zealand Pharma signing up for OTR Therapeutics’ oral small-molecule platform.