Repertoire Immune Medicines, a biotechnology company developing programmable T cell targeted immune medicines, has entered a multi-year strategic collaboration with Bristol Myers Squibb to develop tolerizing vaccines for up to three autoimmune diseases. The collaboration aims to develop efficacious, selective, and durable treatments for autoimmune disease by resetting the immune system.
 
Repertoire will receive $65 million upfront, and up to $1.8 billion for achieving development, regulatory and commercial milestones, as well as royalties.
 
Repertoire will lead all activities through to development candidate nomination, while BMS will lead clinical development, regulatory affairs, and commercialization of the tolerizing vaccines under an exclusive world-wide license. Repertoire will use its T cell receptor (TCR)-epitope discovery platform, DECODE, and its lipid nanoparticle delivery technology to discover and develop the tolerizing vaccine candidates. In addition, it will deploy DECODE to monitor immune responses to the tolerizing vaccines in patients during clinical development to provide insights into the pharmacodynamic effect of the vaccines.
 
“This agreement is a recognition of the transformative power of Repertoire’s DECODE platform to discover and develop programmable T cell targeted immune medicines,” said Torben Straight Nissen, Ph.D., CEO of Repertoire and Executive Partner of Flagship Pioneering. “We are excited to collaborate with Bristol Myers Squibb to combine their leadership in immunology with our unique ability to discover key disease-associated epitopes in patients with autoimmune diseases. This collaboration enables us to serve patients suffering from autoimmune diseases by translating our DECODE discoveries into potentially transformative medicines that address the underlying cause of their disease.”
 
“Bristol Myers Squibb strives to change the treatment paradigm for patients with autoimmune and immune-mediated diseases with a commitment to the discovery and development of transformational medicines,” said Francisco Ramírez-Valle, M.D., Ph.D., senior vice president and head of the Immunology & Cardiovascular Thematic Research Center at Bristol Myers Squibb. “Our collaboration with Repertoire aims to selectively reset the immune system, reflecting a key component of our immunology research strategy, which we believe may offer long term benefit while mitigating unintended consequences associated with broad immune suppression.”