Dicerna Announces Boehringer Ingelheim’s Acceptance of Candidate for Development Under RNAi Research Collaboration and License Agreement

Dicerna Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a leading developer of investigational ribonucleic acid interference (RNAi) therapeutics, announced that Boehringer Ingelheim has accepted a GalXC™ RNAi candidate for advancement under the existing agreement between the companies for the discovery and development of novel therapies for the treatment of chronic liver diseases. Referred to as DCR-LIV2, the compound will be investigated for the treatment of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), a chronic liver disease for which there are no approved therapeutic interventions. 

Acceptance of DCR-LIV2 as a development candidate triggered a single-digit multimillion USD preclinical milestone payment to Dicerna, which the Company expects to receive in the second quarter of 2021.

Advancing this selected target to development demonstrates the commitment of our team and our collaborative partners at Boehringer Ingelheim to discovering new and innovative ways to treat NASH using RNAi,” said Bob D. Brown, Ph.D., Dicerna’s Chief Scientific Officer and Executive Vice President of R&D. “Dicerna’s GalXC technology is the ideal platform for this vital work. What’s more, this announcement marks an important milestone for Dicerna and highlights the productivity of our RNAi discovery research engine, as all of Dicerna’s discovery-oriented collaborations have now produced GalXC-based development candidates that are advancing toward the clinic or have already entered clinical development.”

Under the terms of the existing agreement between Dicerna and Boehringer Ingelheim, Dicerna is eligible to receive up to $170.0 million in potential additional development and commercial milestones related to DCR-LIV2. Dicerna is also eligible to receive tiered mid-single-digit royalties on potential global net sales.