Set them free

In a week where Atlas Venture announced two additions to its growing stable of prenegotiated build-to-buy deals, Johnson & Johnson is bucking the trend with a new program for out-licensing assets that in some cases may not include any built-in claw-back rights at all.

What makes that particularly interesting is that, in contrast to similar pharma programs aimed squarely at externalizing non-core assets, J&J is likely to pitch in assets it considers strategic that come from its core therapeutic areas of cancer, CNS, infectious diseases, immunology and cardiometabolic disorders...