Cartography Biosciences Advances Strategic Oncology Collaboration with Gilead’s First Option Target Exercise
Cartography Biosciences Advances Strategic Oncology Collaboration with Gilead’s First Option Target Exercise
– Novel oncology target identified by Cartography ATLAS and SUMMIT platforms –
– Milestone underscores strength of platform and advances collaboration pipeline –
SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Cartography Biosciences, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company advancing a differentiated pipeline of antibody-based cancer therapies, today announced that Gilead Sciences, Inc. has exercised the first of its options to exclusively license a novel oncology target discovered and validated through Cartography’s proprietary ATLAS and SUMMIT platforms arising out of the parties’ collaboration.
“This milestone demonstrates the power of our ATLAS and SUMMIT platforms and their ability to systematically identify and validate high-value, tumor-selective targets,” said Kevin Parker, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of Cartography Biosciences.
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The option exercise represents a key milestone in the companies’ multi-year strategic collaboration to discover and develop therapies against novel tumor-selective targets and target pairs in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) and the most common form of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), adenocarcinoma.
“This milestone demonstrates the power of our ATLAS and SUMMIT platforms and their ability to systematically identify and validate high-value, tumor-selective targets,” said Kevin Parker, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of Cartography Biosciences. “Gilead’s decision to advance this program highlights the strength of our discovery engine and the potential to expand the landscape of actionable targets in solid tumors. We look forward to continuing our collaboration and progressing additional programs toward the clinic.”
Under the terms of the agreement, Gilead will assume responsibility for further research, development, and commercialization of programs directed to the optioned target. Cartography will receive an option exercise fee, as well as potential future development, regulatory, and commercial milestone payments and royalties on product sales.
“Gilead’s exercise of this first option is a meaningful step in our collaboration and reflects the strength of the targets emerging from our platform,” said Chester Wong, SVP, Head of Business Development at Cartography Biosciences. “We are excited about the continued momentum of the collaboration and the opportunity to advance additional programs together.”
The collaboration leverages Cartography’s ATLAS and SUMMIT platforms, which translate insights from proprietary single-cell datasets into cell-specific therapies. Cartography’s computational biology and target validation platforms identify tumor antigens and antigen combinations with high specificity that are designed to address a central challenge in oncology—identifying targets that enable potent anti-tumor activity while minimizing off-tumor toxicity.
Cartography continues to apply its platforms to generate a pipeline of novel targets and target pairs across solid tumors, supporting both partnered programs and its growing, wholly owned portfolio, including its lead clinical program, CBI-1214, a T-cell engager currently being evaluated in a Phase 1 trial for colorectal cancer.
Cartography will continue discovery and validation activities under the collaboration, with Gilead retaining option rights to additional targets emerging from the platform.
About Cartography Biosciences
Cartography Biosciences is advancing a differentiated oncology pipeline of antibody-based therapies designed to target tumors with unprecedented precision. The company’s ATLAS and SUMMIT discovery platforms are powered by an industry-leading, fully integrated dataset spanning hundreds of thousands of cell states across healthy tissues alongside large-scale single-cell profiling of patient tumors. By combining petabyte-scale proprietary data, machine learning, and AI-driven biological insights, Cartography is identifying highly specific tumor targets and logic-gated target combinations to generate therapies engineered for maximal tumor selectivity and meaningful patient impact. The company’s lead program, CBI-1214, is a T-cell engager in development for colorectal cancer. CBI-1214 entered the clinic in early 2026 and is currently enrolling and treating patients in a phase 1 trial.
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