Voyager Therapeutics has entered a license agreement with ReGenX to use the gene therapy firm's NAV® vectors to develop and commercialize gene therapies to treat amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Friedreich's ataxia, and Huntington's disease. The license ReGenX granted Voyager per the agreement is nonexclusive and worldwide; Voyager is also picking up sublicensing rights to the NAV vectors.

ReGenX is getting an undisclosed upfront fee from Voyager in exchange, plus ongoing fees, milestones, and sales royalties of products incorporating the vectors. ReGenX is also getting a share of the sublicensing revenues. Voyager's interim CEO Mark Levin added in a statement that the company believes the rights to use the NAV vectors will position it to advance more quickly the development of breakthrough CNS gene therapies.

ReGenX' NAV vector technology includes the AAV vectors rAAV7, rAAV8, rAAV9, and rAAVrh10, and Voyager isn't the only organization who've expressed an interest in them: This past March ReGenX gave Laboratorios Dr. Esteve a nonexclusive worldwide license to use its NAV rAAV9 vectors to develop treatments of the rare lysosomal storage disease mucopolysaccharidosis type IIIA (a.k.a, Sanfilippo syndrome Type A) in humans.

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