Cerevance Achieves Second Milestone in Research Collaboration with Merck

BOSTON, Oct. 08, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Cerevance, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company advancing multiple cell type-specific therapies for the treatment of neurodegenerative, psychiatric and central nervous system-controlled metabolic disorders, announced the achievement of the second milestone in its research collaboration with Merck, known as MSD outside of the United States and Canada. The research collaboration, which was announced in August of 2022, focuses on the identification and validation of novel therapeutic targets for Alzheimer’s disease. The achievement of this milestone triggers a payment from Merck to Cerevance.

“We are very pleased with the progress we continue to make in our research collaboration with Merck,” said Craig Thompson, chief executive officer of Cerevance. “This milestone highlights the potential of our proprietary Nuclear Enriched Transcript Sort sequencing platform to identify novel targets for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological disorders.”

Under the collaboration, Cerevance identifies targets using NETSseq from which Merck may select an undisclosed number of targets to advance to target validation.

About Cerevance
Cerevance is focused on advancing cell type-specific therapies for the treatment of neurodegenerative, psychiatric and central nervous system (“CNS”)-controlled metabolic disorders. Our proprietary platform, Nuclear Enriched Transcript Sort sequencing (NETSseq), allows us to identify targets that are expressed at very low levels, that are present in rare cell types, or that change over time as a disease progresses. Our most advanced product candidate, solengepras (CVN424), is currently in Phase 3 development and has the potential to be a first-in-class, oral non-dopaminergic therapy for both the motor and non-motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. Our second product candidate, CVN766, is designed to be a highly selective oral antagonist of the orexin 1 receptor that we plan to evaluate in a Phase 2 study for the potential treatment of binge eating disorder and schizophrenia. Our third product candidate, CVN293, is a highly selective oral inhibitor targeting potassium two pore domain channel subfamily K member 13 (KCNK13) and represents a potentially novel intervention point for neurodegenerative disorders by reducing neuroinflammation. We plan to evaluate CVN293 in a Phase 2 study for the potential treatment of frontotemporal dementia.

Contacts

Cerevance:
Johnna Simões, ir@cerevance.com

Media:
Andrew Mielach, amielach@lifescicomms.com, +1-646-876-5868