TIGIT targets have become the focus of many pharmaceutical companies, and R&D and cooperation are increasing day by day

Recently, Junshi Bio announced the expansion of the scope of cooperation with Coherus, which has initiated the licensing option of JS006 (TIGIT monoclonal antibody) in the United States and Canada
.
To this end, Junshi Bio will receive an upfront payment of $35 million, development, filing and sales milestone payments of up to $255 million, and an 18% sales share of net product sales
.
It is understood that in the overseas license agreement of PD-1 antibody signed by Junshi Biotech and Coherus in February last year, the two agreed that Coherus also has two products including TIGIT antibody in addition to the overseas license of PD-1 antibody.
right of choice
.
In this authorization, Junshi Bio also mentioned that TIGIT antibody and PD-1 antibody have shown synergistic potential, and Coherus plans to conduct late-stage clinical trials of PD-1 antibody combination therapy in North America
.
It is worth noting that this is actually the second TIGIT mAb in China since 2021
.
It is reported that on December 21, 2021, BeiGene announced a cooperation agreement with Novartis to license the TIGIT antibody to the latter for $2.
9 billion
.
This is another major cooperation between BeiGene and Novartis following the PD-1 monoclonal antibody Baizean® (generic name: Tislelizumab injection)
.
This transaction also refreshed the domestic License out transaction record at the end of the year
.
The industry believes that after Novartis received BeiGene's PD-1, it has to start with the latter's TIGIT monoclonal antibody, mainly because large pharmaceutical companies are now scanning TIGIT antibodies, and Novartis' own product pipeline does not have TIGIT antibodies.
Hence the need to fill in the gaps
.
In addition, BeiGene's TIGIT antibody research and development progress is at the forefront of the world
.
According to the data, TIGIT, whose full name is T cell immunoreceptor with Ig and ITIM domains (T cell immunoreceptor with Ig and ITIM domains), is an emerging oncology target that has attracted the attention of many biopharmaceutical companies in recent years.
The role is similar to that of PD-1/L1
.
It is worth mentioning that studies have shown that TIGIT inhibitors and PD-1/L1 inhibitors can play a synergistic anti-tumor effect
.
Therefore, the combination therapy of PD-(L)1+TIGIT is gradually becoming a new focus of competition among pharmaceutical companies
.
At present, in addition to the above companies, a large number of companies such as Gilead, GSK, BMS, etc.
have also successively deployed in this field
.
Among them, Roche and Merck are relatively advanced in R&D progress, and both are in large-scale mid-to-late clinical projects
.
On the whole, the industry believes that the popularity of TIGIT antibodies has risen.
After all, the domestic PD-1 market has been very "introduced"
.
According to the new medical insurance negotiation results, the average annual treatment cost of the four domestic PD-1 companies after the negotiation has dropped to less than 50,000 yuan, and the patient’s self-paid part is less than 10,000 yuan.
The original 100 billion-level market has dropped to 10 billion.
level
.
When PD-1 competition becomes more and more fierce and profits continue to decline, participants will naturally start looking for new growth points
.
At present, TIGIT, LAG-3 and TIM-3 have become the three major "potential stocks" recognized by the industry
.
Among them, TIGIT is the hotter one
.
Although TIGIT monoclonal antibody has not yet been clinically marketed, the industry generally believes that with the continuous entry of pharmaceutical companies and the development of more and more clinical trials, future innovations will begin to emerge gradually
.