Penn strikes deal with Biogen for gene therapy
Biogen Inc. announced a research collaboration on gene therapy and gene editing with the University of Pennsylvania that will pay the West Philadelphia institution $20 million upfront, with an additional $62.5 million committed over the next three to five years for research and development costs.
Biogen Inc. announced a research collaboration on gene therapy and gene editing with the University of Pennsylvania that will pay the West Philadelphia institution $20 million upfront, with an additional $62.5 million committed over the next three to five years for research and development costs.
Biogen, a biotechnology firm based in Cambridge, Mass., said the collaboration with Penn professors James Wilson and Jean Bennett, will focus primarily on therapies for diseases that target the eyes, skeletal muscles, and the central nervious system.
Additional aspects of the research, which encompasses seven preclinical programs, will include attempts to validate new techniques for transfering genes, Biogen said.
Separately, Biogen has licensed from Regenxbio Inc. certain other gene technologies that were developed in Wilson's laboratory at Penn. Wilson, who is director of Penn's Gene Therapy Program, holds stock in Regenxbio, which is based in Rockville, Md.
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