Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited Neuroscience Drug Discovery Unit is searching for assets in Lead Generation stage available for out-licensing or partnerships, which may enhance our pipeline. The initial step may be for Takeda to ask for asset sharing to perform profiling.

• Application due date: February 28, 2023

Area of interest

Indications of interest

• Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)
• Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD)
• Alzheimer’s disease (AD)
• Parkinson’s disease (PD)
• Multiple system atrophy (MSA)
• Down syndrome with Alzheimer’s disease
• Cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA)
• Huntington’s disease (HD)
• Hereditary ataxias
• Spinal bulbar muscular atrophy (SBMA)
• Muscular dystrophies (DM1, FSHD, DMD)
• Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT)
• Developmental and epileptic encephalopathies

Any therapeutic modality may be used (e.g. small molecules, antibodies, nucleic acids, etc.) as long as it is rationally acceptable

Asset should have human/patient-based therapeutic rationale addressing the current unmet needs of the potential target population and unique selling point versus competitor assets targeting same indication or mechanism

Some specific mechanisms of interest are;

• Key autonomous and non-autonomous disease-relevant pathways including aberrant glial cells in neurodegenerative disorders
• Cellular senescence in neurodegenerative disorders
• Disease-relevant stress granules, liquid-liquid phase separation
• Novel therapeutic approaches related to autophagy and mitophagy
• Targets or therapeutic hypothesis established from patient-based findings for neurodegeneration (e.g. approaches addressing sleep/circadian rhythm, waste clearance, BBB integrity, anti-chronic inflammation, organelle homeostasis, DNA damage)
• Innovative therapeutic approaches for signature features of genetic neurological disorders including abnormal DNA/RNA structures, RNA splicing and protein production widely observed in rare/intractable neurological diseases, somatic instability

Lead Generation stage assets should meet the following

• Screening or initial lead design is completed
• Key proof of mechanism/proof of concept data in relation to target or therapeutic hypothesis has been obtained using such lead candidates
• Assays for further asset selection and optimization is established
• No critical on-target safety/toxicity issues have been identified and current safety data supports further development of leads
• Patent strategy is available

Area of “No” interest

• Indications which are out of focus are: multiple sclerosis, acute ischemic stroke, traumatic brain injury, cerebral thrombosis, cerebral hemorrhage
• Mechanisms which are out of focus are: dopaminergic agents for Parkinson’s disease, palliative treatments for hereditary neurological diseases such as anti-convulsant for developmental and epileptic encephalopathies

Apply here