AbbVie Enters Partnership to Develop COVID-19 Antibody Therapies

AbbVie has entered into a partnership with Harbour BioMed (HBM), Utrecht University (UU) and Erasmus Medical Center (EMC) to develop a monoclonal antibody therapy for COVID-19.

The partnership will advance the fully human, neutralizing antibody 47D11 discovered by UU, EMC and HBM. The drugmaker will support its partners through preclinical activities while preparing for later-stage preclinical and clinical development work.

Through the partnership, AbbVie has gained the right to exclusively license the antibody for therapeutic clinical development and global commercialization, the company said.

“The antibody discovered by UU, EMC and Harbour BioMed is extremely promising based on the mechanism by which it targets the virus and on its developability as a fully human protein," said Tom Hudson, AbbVie’s chief scientific officer.

The antibody, which targets the coronavirus’ spike protein, proved effective in laboratory  studies in blocking infection by SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, as well as SARS-CoV, which causes severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). — James Miessler and Jordan Williams