VYNE and Tay Therapeutics reach licence agreement

Deal involves an oral BET inhibitor which treats fibrotic and immuno-inflammatory disorders

University of Dundee-based Tay Therapeutics – a company focused on developing small molecules for oncology – has announced that it has reached an exclusive licence agreement with VYNE Therapeutics.

The agreement concerns the developing proprietary and differentiated treatments in immuno-inflammatory diseases, for Tay’s Bromodomain and Extra-Terminal motif (BET) inhibitor, TAY-B2 (VYN202).

In 2021, Tay out-licenced its topical pan-BET inhibitor to VYNE for £16m in upfront and milestone payments. The out-licensing of both of Tay Therapeutics’ BET inhibitor projects will now bring potential milestone revenues of over $65m for the first indications along. In addition it will yield royalty payments of up to 10% of net annual sales.

Meanwhile, TAY-B2 (VYN202) has showed potent anti-inflammatory and anti-fibrotic effects among multiple validated preclinical models, leading VYNE to trigger its option of progressing the candidate into a pivotal phase 1 study. This will treat significant immuno-inflammatory conditions with high unmet need.

David Domzalski, president and chief executive officer at VYNE, reflected: “We are thrilled to be licensing the oral BET project from Tay. As a result of our productive partnership, we are poised to announce clinical results for the topical BET inhibitor that we in-licenced from Tay about two years ago and look forward to developing an oral BET inhibitor molecule in immuno-inflammatory conditions that we believe, based on pre-clinical results, is potentially best-in-class.”

Dr Andrew Woodland, chief executive officer at Tay Therapeutics, added: “The second deal with VYNE is the culmination of two years of discovery and development of BET inhibitors with differentiated selectivity and safety profiles. I’m delighted for the Tay team and consider VYNE ideally placed to continue developing and maximising the value of the BET inhibitor projects.”

He concluded: “This deal further validates Tay’s business model of growing organically using revenues to support development activities with approximately £6m received in upfront and milestone payments from the VYNE collaboration to date.”