NEW YORK – ERS Genomics said on Tuesday that it has signed an agreement to nonexclusively license its CRISPR-Cas9 patent portfolio to Japanese biotechnology company Japan SLC.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Dublin-based ERS was founded to provide access to CRISPR-Cas9 intellectual property held by Emmanuelle Charpentier. The IP is shared among her, Jennifer Doudna and the University of California, and the University of Vienna. The IP is separate from genome editing patents held by the Broad Institute.
Japan SLC provides animal models to the research community, including outbred, inbred, immunodeficient, congenic, hybrid, disease, and transgenic models. The company said it will use ERS' CRISPR-Cas9 technology to expand its animal model offerings.
"Our production and supply of laboratory animals will benefit greatly through the use of the revolutionary CRISPR-Cas9 technology," Japan SLC President Hirotaka Takagi said in a statement. "We are very excited to sign this licensing agreement with ERS Genomics which will enable us to produce CRISPR-edited mouse and rat models."
ERS also granted a license to its portfolio to Japanese biotechnology company Nippon Gene earlier this month.