Quince Therapeutics Completes the Sale of Legacy Protease Inhibitor Portfolio to Lighthouse Pharmaceuticals

Quince Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: QNCX), a biopharmaceutical company advancing innovative precision therapeutics targeting debilitating and rare diseases, announced the sale of the company’s legacy small molecule protease inhibitor portfolio, including COR588, COR388, COR852, and COR803, pursuant to an asset purchase agreement with Lighthouse Pharmaceuticals, Inc., an entity co-founded by Casey Lynch, former chief executive officer of Quince’s predecessor company Cortexyme.

Lead compound COR588 is a selective, oral small molecule inhibitor of lysine-gingipain that is Phase 2 ready for further evaluation in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease with mild to moderate dementia and biomarker evidence of P. gingivalis infection. Precision targeting of gingipains with small molecule inhibitors represents an innovative therapeutic approach to addressing P. gingivalis, a bacterium associated with dementia and other degenerative and inflammatory disorders.

“This transaction represents the fulfillment of our previously stated objective to out-license Quince’s legacy protease inhibitor portfolio,” said Dirk Thye, M.D., Quince’s chief executive officer. “We are pleased to transfer these programs to Lighthouse as they have a tremendous amount of expertise, experience, and historical knowledge of the compounds and therapeutic area. Given the role of Lighthouse’s principals in advancing the foundational science and clinical development related to these assets, we believe they are in a strong position to build upon the existing human and preclinical data to advance these compounds.”

“This acquisition enables the important continued development of gingipain inhibitors for dementia and other disorders,” said Casey Lynch, Lighthouse Pharmaceutical’s chief executive officer. “Informed by the learnings from previous late-stage clinical studies, Lighthouse will move quickly to advance COR588 into key clinical studies to further validate this treatment paradigm and bring innovative treatments to patients.”

Highlights of the asset purchase agreement include:

• Lighthouse gains exclusive rights to develop, manufacture, and commercialize Quince’s legacy protease inhibitor portfolio globally;
• Protease inhibitor portfolio includes lysine- and arginine-gingipain inhibitors COR588, COR388, COR852, in addition to COR803, which is a coronavirus 3CLpro targeted program with demonstrated in vivo efficacy;
• Potential for Quince to receive up to $150 million in regulatory and commercial milestones payments on a product-by-product basis, subject to conditions in the agreement;
• Potential tiered royalty rates on a product-by-product basis ranging from high single-digit to mid-teens of annual net sales related to the two existing clinical stage programs, and low single-digit royalties for the preclinical programs, subject to conditions in the agreement;
• Share of sublicense income or acquisition value of clinical and preclinical assets on a product-by-product basis; and
• Quince to receive a 7.5% ownership stake of Lighthouse Common stock with anti-dilution through the first $10 million raised.

Quince expects to benefit from the reduction of more than $500,000 of annualized expenses associated with the operational and financial support of these protease inhibitor assets.