New chapter in collaboration between Taiwan and China
BeBetter and PharmaEngine to design, synthesise and develop new chemical entities against predefined targets in oncology
A collaboration has been signed that opens a new chapter for partnership between Taiwan and China in searching for novel anticancer drugs. Taiwan’s PharmaEngine has collaborated and signed a research agreement with China’s Guangzhou BeBetter Medicine Technology. The two companies are to collaborate to design, synthesise and develop new chemical entities against predefined targets in oncology.
Under the terms of the agreement, PharmaEngine will hold the exclusive worldwide rights for manufacturing, development and commercialisation of new drug candidates with the exception of China, while Guangzhou BeBetter will keep the respective rights in China (including Hong Kong and Macau).
BeBetter is responsible for discovering optimised compounds for IND-enabling studies. PharmaEngine will be responsible for development and commercialisation.
Dr Changgeng Qian, founder of BeBetter, served as Senior Vice President at US company Curis, based in Cambridge, and has an excellent track record of discovering novel compounds against cancer. Dr Qian played a key role in the collaboration between Curis and Genentech to develop Erivedge, the first approved cancer drug to target the hedgehog protein. Erivedge received regulatory approval from the US FDA in January 2012 for the treatment of basal cell carcinoma.
Dr Qian and C. Grace Yeh, CEO of PharmaEngine, were also colleagues in several biopharma companies in the US, including Millennium Pharmaceuticals.