MRK Merck and Co Inc

By Colin Kellaher

Merck & Co. on Thursday said it agreed to buy privately held VelosBio Inc. for $2.75 billion in cash, in a deal that expands the drugmaker's oncology pipeline.

Merck said VelosBio is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing cancer therapies targeting receptor tyrosine kinase-like orphan receptor 1.

VelosBio's lead investigational candidate, VLS-101, is currently being evaluated in a Phase 1 trial in hematologic malignancies and a Phase 2 study in solid tumors, Merck said.

The Kenilworth, N.J., company said it expects to complete the acquisition of VelosBio by the end of the year.

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

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

November 05, 2020 08:08 ET (13:08 GMT)

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