Drug giant Bayer Inc. has doubled down on one of its previous investment, announcing a deal to acquire BlueRock Therapeutics that values the Cambridge startup at $1 billion.
The German drugmaker said Thursday morning that it will pay $240 million upfront and $360 million in milestone payments for the cell therapy startup, which is developing treatments for Parkinson’s disease, heart failure and other conditions.
BlueRock is the latest preclinical company to be purchased by a large pharmaceutical or biotech firm in recent months. Lexington startup IFM Tre was acquired by Novartis in April, while Tilos Therapeutics was purchased by Merck & Co. in June. BlueRock expects to begin testing its first treatment in humans by the end of the year.
Bayer currently has a 41 percent stake in BlueRock three years after forming it with Versant Ventures in 2016.
“In line with our strategy to ramp up our investments in technologies with breakthrough innovation potential, we have decided to build our cell therapy pipeline based on BlueRock Therapeutics’ industry-leading iPSC platform. Ultimately, we are joining forces to deliver new treatment options for medical needs that are still unmet today,” the head of Bayer’s pharmaceuticals division, Stefan Oelrich, said in a statement.
The acquisition will not affect the research collaboration deal BlueRock signedwith gene editing startup Editas Medicine (Nasdaq: EDIT) earlier this year.
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