Amunix, Janssen Biotech sign XTEN technology licensing contract

The collaboration aims at leveraging Amunix’s XTEN half-life extension technology in Janssen’s protein and/or peptide therapeutics.

Amunix president Volker Schellenberger said XTEN polymer can be integrated with a range of proteins and peptides.

"Collaborations such as this are a central element of our strategy to facilitate the use of XTEN in a wide range of therapeutic applications," Schellenberger added.

According to the contract, Amunix will support the engineering of around three of Janssen XTEN fusion proteins for which it will earn an initial upfront payment and R&D funding.

Amunix is also entitled to obtain future milestone and royalty payments from Janssen, which will look after preclinical and clinical development activities in addition to manufacturing and commercialization of the products resulting from the collaboration.

Further financial details of the deal were not revealed.