On November 1, 2021, Synthekine Inc., an engineered cytokine therapeutics company, announced that it has entered into a worldwide research collaboration and license agreement with Merck, known as MSD outside the United States and Canada. The collaboration will leverage Synthekine’s proprietary surrogate cytokine agonist platform to discover, develop, and commercialize novel cytokine therapeutics. Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati advised Synthekine on the transaction.

Under the terms of the agreement, Synthekine is responsible for initial research efforts in collaboration with Merck, and Merck will have exclusive rights to develop, manufacture, and commercialize surrogate cytokine agonists for up to two cytokine targets. Initially, the collaboration will focus on a target that has the potential to treat autoimmune diseases. Merck will make an upfront payment and will make an additional one-time payment if it designates a second target. Synthekine will be eligible for up to $525 million in development, regulatory, and commercialization milestones, as well as tiered royalties on net sales, for each target. Merck will provide research funding to Synthekine for programs under the collaboration.

The Wilson Sonsini team that advised Synthekine on the transaction included Ken Clark, Jennifer Knapp, Myra Sutanto Shen, Tait Graves, and David Pirko.

For more information, please see Synthekine’s press release.