NEW YORK – Caris Life Sciences and HotSpot Therapeutics announced on Monday a strategic partnership to develop HotSpot's portfolio of precision medicine products and potential companion diagnostic tests.
The collaborators will initially focus on two therapeutic programs, one of which involves guiding HotSpot's E3 ubiquitin ligase immunotherapy program from pre-first-in-human trials to potential CDx tests and product launch.
Additionally, Caris has negotiation rights for CDx tests resulting from partnership therapeutic programs.
The partners did not disclose financial details of the collaboration but wrote that financial commitments are based on program specifics and that it has the potential to exceed $40 million, pending regulatory approvals and additional milestones.
The partnership specifically marries Caris' whole-exome and whole-transcriptome molecular profiling capabilities with HotSpot's Smart Allostery drug discovery platform, which aims to systematically identify functional pockets on proteins that can be targeted by rationally designed novel therapeutics.
"Access to Caris' comprehensive suite of tissue and liquid profiling, real-world data, and broader capabilities will enable robust interrogation of large datasets to accelerate our drug development efforts," Jonathan Montagu, HotSpot's founder and CEO, said in a statement. "This collaboration will yield data-informed insights to inform and speed clinical development and rapidly deliver new treatment options to patients."