Voyager Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:VYGR) stock rocketed Friday after the gene therapy company and AbbVie Inc (NYSE:ABBV) announced a collaboration to develop antibodies to treat Parkinson's disease.
Shares in Voyager soared 24.06% to $13.25, while AbbVie stock climbed 1.4% to $79.83 in midday trade Friday.
Under terms of the collaboration, Voyager will receive $65 million upfront and up to $245 million in preclinical and phase 1 option payments, as well as up to an additional $728 million in potential milestone payments and royalties.
Voyager is also eligible to earn up to a total of $500 million in commercial milestones.
READ: Voyager Therapeutics sells gene therapy programs to Neurocrine Biosciences for $165M
AbbVie said it was hopeful Voyager’s technology would enable it to develop “transformative treatments” for patients with neurodegenerative diseases.
“The expansion of AbbVie’s partnership with Voyager represents the potential we see in the ability of its vectorized antibody platform to surpass the blood-brain barrier and more effectively deliver biologic therapies,” said Jim Summers, VP of discovery neuroscience research at AbbVie, in a statement.
Parkinson’s disease is the second-most common neurodegenerative disorder. A hallmark of Parkinson’s is the accumulation of misfolded alpha-synuclein that can lead to the formation of protein deposits and neurodegeneration. Approaches to interfere with this process could potentially delay the progression of Parkinson’s disease.
“Our scientific platform allows us to develop unique AAV gene therapies that are designed to knock down disease-causing gene expression, increase the expression of missing proteins, or enable the expression of therapeutic antibodies through vectorization,” said Voyager Therapeutics Andre Turenne. “We are excited to expand our efforts towards pathological species of alpha-synuclein given its role in the progression of disease, and AbbVie is the ideal partner to advance this new target and therapeutic modality.”
Based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Voyager Therapeutics is a clinical-stage gene therapy company focused on developing life-changing treatments for severe neurological diseases.
Contact Uttara Choudhury at uttara@proactiveinvestors.com
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