Ambit Biosciences Announces Second Expansion of Collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb

Ambit Biosciences has announced a second expansion of its collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb Company for the discovery and development of novel kinase inhibitors. As part of this expansion, Ambit will screen Bristol-Myers Squibb’s kinase-focused library using Ambit’s proprietary KinomeScan™ technology.

KinomeScan is a high-throughput method for screening small molecule libraries against a large number of human kinases. At 353 human kinases, Ambit’s largest panel, KinoMAX™, is the world’s most comprehensive kinase profiling panel. Ambit and Bristol-Myers Squibb began their first KinomeScan collaboration in 2004.

“We are very pleased with Bristol-Myers Squibb’s continued adoption of our KinomeScan technology for their kinase discovery efforts. This next step in our relationship joins Bristol-Myers Squibb’s premier chemistry with Ambit’s unparalleled kinase screening and discovery technology to accelerate the advancement of high quality drug candidates into clinical development,” said Scott Salka, Chief Executive Officer of Ambit.

Salka continued, “The unprecedented scale of this library screening project provides us with yet another opportunity to showcase the unique attributes of KinomeScan: panel size, screening throughput, data quality, turnaround time and cost efficiency.”

Under the terms of the agreement, Bristol Myers-Squibb will make an undisclosed up-front cash payment to Ambit. In addition, Ambit will receive rights to certain preclinical and clinical compounds of Bristol-Myers Squibb.