Johnson & Johnson Innovation explores early-stage innovation in pharmaceuticals, medical devices and consumer healthcare
Deals include new approaches for cancer, diabetes, autoimmune disease and Alzheimer\'s
Johnson & Johnson Innovation (J&J Innovation) has announced 12 new alliances with life science companies and research institutions around the globe to explore early-stage innovation in a range of therapeutic areas and across pharmaceuticals, medical devices and diagnostics, and consumer healthcare.
'The future of healthcare will be defined by companies, academic institutions and governments that collaborate to leverage existing strengths, while at the same time think outside current paradigms and experiment with new ways of innovating,' said Paul Stoffels, Chief Scientific Officer, Johnson & Johnson and Worldwide Chairman, Pharmaceuticals.
'By being where these new frontiers in science and technology are being forged, our goal is to translate these insights into promising treatments for the future.'
Launched more than a year ago, the Johnson & Johnson Innovation centres are working to identify early-stage technologies and translate them into commercial products.
The new deals include creating new brown fat for metabolic diseases and advancing novel science in areas of significant unmet medical need such as lymphoma, rheumatoid arthritis, prostate cancer, dementia, Alzheimer's, diabetes and insomnia.
Our goal is to translate these insights into promising treatments for the future
Stoffels added that the broad variety of the collaborations, and the unique ways in which Johnson & Johnson is working with its collaborators, 'illustrates our strong commitment to being flexible and creative in our dealmaking in order to maximise the potential of each individual technology'.
The collaborations include:
- Targeting Lymphoma – Janssen Biotech and J&J Innovation have formed a research collaboration with Weill Cornell Medical College aimed at developing compounds for targeting the function of a lymphoma causing protein. Investigators at Weill Cornell and Janssen drug development researchers will collaborate to discover, validate and characterise inhibitors of the protein and further elucidate novel targeting methods.
- Novel Immunotherapies for Prostate Cancer – Janssen Biotech and J&J Innovation have obtained an exclusive, worldwide license from Aduro BioTech to certain product candidates specifically engineered for the treatment of prostate cancer. In a separate transaction, Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation participated in a Series C equity round raised by Aduro.
- Accelerating Progress on Dementia Research – the neuroscience therapeutic area of Janssen Research & Development will participate in the UK Dementias Research Platform, announced earlier this week (19 June).
- Putting Insomnia to Rest – Janssen Pharmaceutica, J&J Innovation and the Janssen neuroscience therapeutic area have established a research collaboration with Minerva Neurosciences, around the development of an orexin-2 antagonist, MIN-202. The programme will focus on the treatment of patients with primary and secondary insomnia and potentially other related neuropsychiatric disorders.
- Epigenetic Modulators in the CNS – Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation participated in the Series A equity investment of Rodin Therapeutics in collaboration with J&J Innovation. Rodin is dedicated to finding epigenetic modulators for the treatment of cognitive disorders, including Alzheimer's disease.
- Creating New Brown Fat – Janssen Pharmaceuticals and J&J Innovation will collaborate with Energesis Pharmaceuticals, which is identifying biological compounds that stimulate the formation of brown fat (BAT) for use in treating metabolic diseases.
- Taking On the Nutrient-Sensing Pathway – Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation has made an equity investment in Navitor Pharmaceuticals. Navitor is developing highly specific modulators of mTORC1, the pathway primarily responsible for cells' response to nutrient availability including cell growth and function. Navitor is leveraging the mTORC1 pathway to develop new therapies for metabolic diseases, like diabetes, as well as autoimmune, musculoskeletal and other disease areas.
- Cardiac Remodelling – Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation has made an equity investment in Ascelegen Therapeutics. Ascelegen is working on developing novel growth factor related therapies for cardiovascular diseases, including heart failure.
- Halting Auto-antigen Production in Rheumatoid Arthritis and Other Autoimmune Diseases – Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation participated in a Series A equity investment in Padlock Therapeutics, a company that is developing new therapies targeting the protein arginine deiminases, a class of enzymes that mediate protein citrullination. Protein citrullination leads to the creation of potent autoantigens implicated in the very earliest events that lead to rheumatoid arthritis and drives inflammation and immune complex formation in active autoimmune disease.
- Exploring the Microbiome's Impact on Health and Disease – Johnson & Johnson Consumer Companies and J&J Innovation have established a collaboration with scientists from The University of Manchester to explore potential applications of probiotic extracts for the prevention and treatment of skin, oral and respiratory conditions.
