Benitec and Alnylam swop RNAi licenses

Brisbane company Benitec (ASX:BLT) has signed a reciprocal licensing agreement with one of its biggest competitors in the RNAi field, US company Alnylam Pharmaceuticals.

Under the agreement Alnylam - which bills itself as "the world's first company focused on RNAi therapeutics" - will give Benitec and its licensees an option to non-exclusively license Alnylam RNAi intellectual property. The IP covers expressed RNAi: targeted gene silencing mediated by short interfering RNAs (siRNAs) generated from DNA constructs introduced into cells.

Alnylam will receive license fees, milestone payments and royalties on any expressed RNAi products developed by Benitec or its licensees using the IP.

In return, Benitec has provided Alnylam with a reciprocal option under reciprocal terms to its IP for expressed RNAi and synthetic siRNAs.

Alnylam has also given Benitec options to take up to five licenses to pursue synthetic RNAi therapeutics against mutually agreed, specific targets. Alnylam would receive license fees, milestone payments and royalties on any synthetic RNAi therapeutics developed by Benitec under this program.

"Alnylam's intellectual property is an extensive and significant portfolio in the industry. This agreement provides Benitec with greatly strengthened IP for our focus on DNA-directed RNAi therapeutics and the added potential to develop synthetic RNAi-based drugs," said Benitec chief executive Sara Cunningham.

Benitec has also granted licenses to Genoway, Combimatrix, Artemix Pharmaceuticals, Panomics, Revivicor, Merck & Co and Promega. It has obtained licenses from the Garvan Institute and Stanford University.

Feature: Running RNAi interference: Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Biogen Idec founder Phillip Sharp talks to Bio-IT World's Nancy Weil about RNAi