Merck (known as MSD outside the US and Canada) has agreed on a multiyear research collaboration with Quotient Therapeutics in a deal worth up to $2.2bn.

Through the collaboration, the companies will work to discover novel drug targets in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) using Quotient’s somatic genomics platform technology.

Under the agreement, Quotient (a Flagship Pioneering company) will receive an upfront payment of $20m, with the company also being eligible for payments of up to $2.2bn through development, regulatory and commercial milestones.

Marc Levesque, VP, Discovery at Merck Research Laboratories, said: “Quotient’s platform has the potential to provide us with unique biological insights into genomic changes that are naturally occurring within patients with IBD.”

Quotient uses natural somatic genomics and computational technologies to develop first-in-class therapies centred around the natural somatic genetic diversity present in patients.

People naturally accumulate somatic genetic mutations during their lives, resulting in each person having trillions of different genomes. Quotient’s platform searches patient tissue for mutations within the context of disease, to find those that cause, or protect from, specific diseases.

As part of a two-year evaluation funded by the Scottish government and Novartis, Scotland has started screening newborn babies for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA).

The two-year evaluation will assess how well SMA screening can detect the condition at an early stage, thereby enabling babies to receive treatment as soon as possible.
Affecting on average three to four babies in Scotland each year, SMA is a rare condition that causes progressive muscle wastage and impacts movement, breathing and swallowing.

Scotland is the first part of the UK to offer SMA screening for all newborn babies as part of the routine heel prick test done around four days after birth.

Previously, diagnosis and testing only began when symptoms appeared, but early presymptomatic treatment offers the best chance for affected children to follow typical developmental pathways and achieve key developmental milestones.

Findings from this evaluation will be used by the UK National Screening Committee to decide on whether SMA screening should be permanently included in the national newborn screening programme.

Newborn babies in Scotland are tested for ten conditions, including cystic fibrosis, congenital hypothyroidism and sickle cell disorders.