Alios, Vertex deal

Alios granted Vertex exclusive, worldwide rights to preclinical HCV candidates ALS-2200 and ALS-2158. Alios will receive $60 million in cash up front, and is eligible for up to $1.5 billion in developmental and sales milestones, plus tiered royalties. The partners plan to start clinical testing of the nucleotide HCV NS5B polymerase inhibitors in 4Q11. Vertex will be responsible for all development costs and will provide Alios with research funding. The deal also includes a research program to discover additional nucleotide analogs that act on HCV polymerase. Vertex will have the option to develop select compounds resulting from the program. ...