Vignette Bio Announces its Merger with Candid Therapeutics

Gunderson Dettmer represented client Vignette Bio, a Foresite Labs incubated company, in its acquisition by Candid Therapeutics, an innovative biotechnology company developing T-cell engager (“TCE”) antibodies that can deplete specific B lymphocyte cell populations and aims to be the first company to bring these novel therapies to market. Candid acquired Vignette Bio and TRC 2004 through a simultaneous three-way merger. This acquisition integrates two cutting-edge bispecific TCEs, including CND106, a BCMAxCD3 bispecific antibody from Vignette Bio and CND261, a CD20xCD3 bispecific antibody from TRC 2004 to accelerate the development of and position to becoming the leader in TCE antibodies for autoimmune diseases.

In the announcement of the merger, Candid Therapeutics chairman, CEO and President Ken Song said, “TCE antibodies have the most promise as scalable and patient friendly drugs to deplete B cells for treatment of a myriad of autoimmune conditions and represents a once in a generation development opportunity. The drugs we are developing at Candid have the potential to go above and beyond the clinical and commercial success of Humira® and Rituxan® and I am thrilled to be leading the Candid team knowing we can possibly make history by changing the paradigm in how autoimmune diseases are treated.”

The Gunderson Dettmer team was led by Jeff Thacker and included John Tolpa, Matthew Rietfors and Yushen Liu.

Companies
Vignette Bio
Candid Therapeutics