Roche, InterMune Combine to develop hepatitis C treatments

Oct 16. Roche (ROG.VX: Quote, Profile, Research) and InterMune Inc. (ITMN.O: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Monday they have agreed to develop and commercialize products from InterMune's hepatitis C protease inhibitor program.

The agreement includes InterMune's ITMN-191, which is expected to enter clinical trials before year end. The companies will also collaborate on a research program to identify, develop and commercialize novel second-generation protease inhibitors for treatment of hepatitis C.

Upon closing, Roche will pay InterMune an upfront payment of $60 million. Assuming the successful development and commercialization of ITMN-191 in the U.S. and other countries, InterMune could potentially receive up to $470 million in milestones, including $35 million within the next 12 months, the companies said.

WHAT IS THIS DRUG AND WHAT DOES IT TARGET?Current treatment options for chronic HCV infections provide sustained virologic response rates of ~50%, indicating novel therapeutic approaches are needed. We therefore embarked on a rational drug design campaign to produce inhibitors of the HCV NS3/4A protease. ITMN 191 emerged from this discovery effort and was nominated as a preclinical candidate.

The HCV genome encodes for glycoproteins E1 and E2 that form the structural proteins
of the virion. Non-structural (NS) proteins NS2, NS3,NS4A, NS4B, NS5A and NS5B have important roles in the polyprotein processing and HCV replication (they are termed polymerases). These are the drug targets.