Qilu Pharmaceutical has struck a deal to tap into Insilico Medicine’s artificial intelligence drug development capabilities, offering up to $120 million to collaborate on small molecules for treating cardiometabolic diseases.
Insilico has established itself at the forefront of efforts to use AI to improve drug development over the past decade. Using a range of AI tools, the Hong Kong-listed biotech discovers drug targets, generates molecules and otherwise seeks to automate and accelerate R&D. The platform has yielded a phase 2b/3 lung disease candidate and deals with companies including Eli Lilly, Sanofi and Servier.
China’s Qilu has now joined the ranks of those Insilico partners. Insilico will use its Pharma.AI platform, the umbrella for its array of AI tools, to design and optimize small molecules against specific, undisclosed targets for cardiometabolic disease management. Examples of cardiometabolic diseases include obesity, Type 2 diabetes and heart failure. The partners are yet to specify which diseases they are targeting.
Once Insilico has designed and optimized the molecules, Qilu will handle all further development and commercialization of the assets. Qilu’s R&D team, which employs more than 5,000 people, has delivered more than 300 products, including 55 that were first to launch in China. The company’s pipeline spans more than 200 programs.
Qilu has put up almost $120 million, including development and commercialization milestone payments, for the chance to add cardiometabolic disease candidates to its pipeline. Neither party has disclosed the size of the upfront fee, with Insilico’s press release and financial regulatory filing (PDF) only giving the total figure including all milestones.
Upfront fees are typically a small part of Insilico’s deals, as is common across the industry for agreements covering early-stage assets. Insilico’s IPO paperwork revealed (PDF) that the company received about $12 million upfront in its deal with Sanofi and $20 million from one of its pacts with Stemline Therapeutics. Exelixis paid a larger upfront, $80 million, but secured a phase 1-ready asset in return.
The Qilu deal follows Insilico’s unveiling of its cardiometabolic disease portfolio in November. With cash flooding into the space after the success of Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk, Insilico revealed small molecules designed to realize the full potential of established targets such as GLP-1R, GIPR, amylin, APJ and Lp(a). The portfolio includes an oral small molecule GLP-1 receptor agonist designed for once-weekly dosing.
Qilu made changes to its pipeline last year, paying about $38 million for a B7-H3-targeted antibody-drug conjugate from Minghui Pharmaceutical and severing its ties to Arbutus Biopharma’s hepatitis B candidate imdusiran.