Bayer Expands its Metastatic Breast Cancer Treatment

Approximately 70% of women diagnosed with breast cancer are triggered by estrogen receptor (ER) positive disease as well as a 20% survival rate once metastasis occurs. Although the overall progress in breast cancer treatment is on track, the treatment options are still limited, particularly to those suffering from metastatic setting.

By Judy Ya-Hsuan Lin

To increase alternative treatment pathways, Bayer and Systems Oncology signed an exclusive global license agreement to co-develop and commercialize ERSO by making an upfront payment of 25 million and eventually achieving a commercial milestone of 345 million to Systems Oncology.

“The collaboration with Systems Oncology combines their deep experience in identifying alternative treatment pathways with our global footprint and established profile in order to develop new treatment options that can improve patient outcomes,” said Marianne De Backer, PhD, MBA, Member of the Executive Committee and EVP, Head Strategy and Business Development and Licensing, Pharmaceuticals Division of Bayer AG.

Systems Oncology is an AI-based cancer therapy development consisting of a cognitive computing platform and scientists from multidisciplinary scopes to perform highly intelligent integrating, modeling and mining from hundreds of molecular, genome and biomedical databases. According to Dr. Joyce O’Shaughnessy, Baylor University Medical Center, Texas Oncology, US Oncology, “with the experienced team at Bayer leading the development effort, I fully expect that this exciting compound has the potential to create a real paradigm-shift for breast cancer care.”

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The cutting-edge treatment ERSO acts as a small molecule activator of the Unfolded Protein Response (UPR) in ER-positive breast cancer cells. Over the process of development, Systems Oncology collaborated with two professors at the University of Illinois, Dr. David Shapiro and Dr. Paul Hergenrother, both pioneers in the biology and chemistry of anticipatory activators of UPR in breast cancer.

Related Article: AI Drug Pioneer Recursion Pharma Raises $239 Million Led by Leaps By Bayer

References:

1. https://media.bayer.com/baynews/baynews.nsf/id/Bayer-Systems-Oncology-exclusive-license-agreement-innovative-breast-cancer-treatment-approach-ERSO?OpenDocument&sessionID=1600399404

Author

Judy Ya-Hsuan Lin

Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.