Versant's unusual build-to-buy model has resulted in Roche acquiring a target for MS based on UCSF research and the venture firm launching a new spinout, Pipeline Therapeutics.
There are a variety of routes for academic research to make its way onto the market – through spinouts, through a corporate purchasing a licence to existing research or through a company partnering a university with a view of developing a specific technology, product or service.
Pharmaceutical firm Roche has followed none of these direct paths. Instead, the company partnered Inception Sciences, the drug discovery engine of venture firm Versant Ventures, in 2014 on one of its programs, dubbed Inception 5, to find a treatment for multiple sclerosis (MS) based on research originating at University of California San Francisco.
MS is, like so many other debilitating diseases, in desperate need of a treatment. The condition affects the brain and the spinal cord, and its symptoms are many – they can include impairment of a patient’s vision, arm or leg movement, sensation and balance. The disease leads to lifelong suffering and…
