[KITA News] Out-licencing deals struck by Korean pharmaceutical firms and healthcare companies surpassed KRW 3 trillion this year

  

Out-licencing deals struck by Korean pharmaceutical firms and healthcare companies surpassed KRW 3 trillion this year

Some Korean pharmaceutical firms and healthcare companies, including GC Cell, Genexine and SK Biopharmaceuticals, posted satisfactory out-licencing performance for two consecutive years

 

The Korean pharmaceutical and bio healthcare industry sector successfully stroke out-licensing deals worth over KRW 3 trillion this year. According a data released by the sector, nine out-licensing deals were stroke with overseas partners this year, which is worth at least KRW 3 trillion won. Although this year’s performance pales in comparison with last year’s performance, which resulted in striking 14 out-licensing deals that were worth approximately KRW 6 trillion, the sector mentioned it is encouraging news that Korean companies managed to sign out-licensing deals for two consecutive years.

GC Cell inked its technology licensing agreement for its anticancer cellular immunotherapy Immuncell-LC® in January this year with Rivaara Immune Private Limited in India. This marks the first case of out-licencing Immuncell-LC®. Ahead of signing this agreement, GC Cell out-licenced three types of CAR-NK cellular immunotherapy last year to Merck & Co. (MSD) in the U.S. that was co-developed with its American partner Artiva Biotherapeutics to treat solid cancers.

Genexine stroke an out-licensing agreement worth approx. KRW 16 billion with an Indonesian pharmaceutical firm KG Bio on March this year to licence its GX-E4 drug used to treat anaemia. Genexine also signed an out-licensing agreement with the same company last year that was worth KRW 1.2 trillion to licence GX-17, a material being developed as a Covid treatment and a cancer immunotherapy. An official from Genexine explained, “Our company has a strategy of holding joint rights of pipelines by engaging in out-licencing from the early stages of clinical trials.” Aside from these achievements by Genexine, other Korean pharmaceutical firms, including ABL Bio, SK Biopharmaceuticals, ISU Abxis, TiumBio and CKD Bio managed to strike out-licensing agreements with overseas partners.

SK Biopharmaceuticals out-licenced Cenobamate - a medication used for the treatment epilepsy - last month to Eurofarma ？ a pharmaceutical firm in Latin America. TiumBio out-licenced its endometriosis treatment to Hanso Pharma in China. An official from SK Biopharmaceuticals mentioned, “We have already completed out-licencing with overseas partners in key markets by last year, including China and Japan” and added, “We will focus on out-licencing with overseas partners in Latin America, Australia, Middle East and Africa regions this year.”

By - KITA.Net (http://kita.org/about/newsView.do?id=&no=2727&searchWrd=&pageIndex=1)