Trubion, Facet Link For Leukemia Drug

Trubion Pharmaceuticals has partnered with Facet Biotech to commercialize TRU-016, a Trubion product in Phase I clinical trials for the treatment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Facet will pay a $20 million up-front fee and buy $10 million in Trubion stock. Trubion could gain another $177 million in milestones as the drug progresses toward the market. TRU-016 is a small modular immunopharmaceutical (SMIP) protein, basically a monoclonal antibody that is one-third to one-half the size of a traditional antibody drug. Trubion uses combinatorial chemistry to assemble SMIPs with a binding domain, a hinge domain, and an effector domain.