By Colin Kellaher

 

Gilead Sciences Inc. Tuesday said it will invest $300 million to acquire a 49.9% stake Tizona Therapeutics Inc., along with an exclusive option to buy the rest of the privately held cancer immunotherapies company for up to $1.25 billion.

The Foster City, Calif., biopharmaceutical company said the additional consideration includes an option exercise fee and potential future milestone payments.

Gilead said it will provide funding to support Tizona's ongoing research and development to advance its novel pipeline. The South San Francisco, Calif., company is developing TTX-080, a potential first-in-class medicine that targets HLA-G, a novel and emerging immune checkpoint expressed across multiple tumor types.

Gilead said Tizona plans to initiate a phase 1 trial evaluating TTX-080 both as a monotherapy and in combination with other agents in patients with advanced cancers.

Gilead said it expects to complete the initial Tizona transaction in the third quarter.

 

Write to Colin Kellaher at colin.kellaher@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 21, 2020 09:02 ET (13:02 GMT)

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