Ligand Pharmaceuticals and Lilly have entered into license and supply agreements for Ligand’s Captisol platform in undisclosed therapeutic areas. Lilly will be permitted to nominate an unlimited number of drug candidates from its internal pipeline for Captisol formulation. Ligand will provide clinical supplies of Captisol, and may ultimately supply commercial quantities of Captisol to Lilly if a product should be successfully commercialized. Ligand will receive a $1 million upfront payment, but further financial terms were not disclosed.

“Ligand is extremely pleased to have Lilly on our roster of high quality partners utilizing the Captisol technology,” said Matt Foehr, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Ligand Pharmaceuticals. “The structure of this expanded platform relationship was designed to easily enable Lilly to bring as many molecules into the collaboration as possible, potentially allowing Ligand to significantly expand its partnered asset portfolio with a very high quality partner.”

Captisol is a patent protected, chemically modified cyclodextrin with a structure designed to optimize the solubility and stability of drugs. This technology was originally developed by Ligand and has enabled five FDA approved products. There are currently more than Captisol-enabled products in development, according to Ligand.