Roche bets on gene therapy with $1.15B Sarepta deal

Roche Holding spent $1.15 billion to obtain the rights to Sarepta Therapeutics' investigational drug to treat duchenne muscular dystrophy outside the United States.

This is the Swiss drugmaker's second major gene therapy deal in a year, having closed a $4.3 billion deal to acquire Spark Therapeutics earlier this month.

In the latest deal, Roche obtains the exclusive right to launch and commercialize SRP-9001, Sarepta’s investigational micro-dystrophin gene therapy, outside the U.S. SRP-9001, currently in clinical development for DMD, is designed to deliver the microdystrophin-encoding gene directly to the muscle tissue for the targeted production of the microdystrophin protein.

Roche will make an upfront payment of $750 million in cash and take a $400 million stake in Sarepta. The drugmakers anticipate that the agreement will close in the first quarter of 2020.

Read the press release