Mysterious BioNTech strikes $60m-plus cancer T cell deal with Lilly

Mainz-based BioNTech, which once called itself "the biggest European biotech that you have never heard of", has announced a research collaboration in cancer immunotherapies with Eli Lilly centered around the German company's assets and platform in T cell receptors (TCR) and chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR T cells). BioNTech will receive a $30m signing on fee and Lilly will make a $30m equity investment in BioNTech's subsidiary, Cell & Gene Therapies.

Dr Sierk Poetting, BioNTech's CFO, told Scrip that Lilly had "bought into its TCR platform" and that this would include "targets already identified by BioNTech and others yet to be identified". He added that those targets would be in more than one indication [within oncology]