Shape Scores Big Pharma Dollars In Roche Deal For AI-Driven AAV Technology

Fresh off its more than $100m series B venture capital round, Shape Therapeutics, Inc. has attracted a major partner – Roche Holding AG – to help develop its adeno-associated viral (AAV) vector gene therapy technology. The size of the deal, with an aggregate value of potentially more than $3bn, highlights the growing attention that large drug makers are paying to next-generation AAV technology coming from the start-up world, especially companies using artificial intelligence (AI) to develop it, as gene therapies have lately been the subject of safety scares.

Seattle-based Shape Therapeutics (ShapeTx) said 24 August that it signed a multi-target partnering and licensing agreement with Roche in which ShapeTx will use RNAfix, its RNA-editing platform, as well as its AAVid technology for tissue-specific AAVs to develop gene therapies for certain targets in Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and rare diseases