Drug development company BioLineRx has signed an out-licensing agreement with Jiangsu Chia-tai Tianqing Pharmaceutical (CCTQ), a Chinese pharmaceutical company in the liver disease therapeutic area, for the development and commercialization of BL-8030, an oral treatment for the Hepatitis C virus (HCV).

"Unfortunately, the prevalence of HCV is relatively significant in China, with reports of 3.2% of the population (approximately 43 million individuals) suffering from this chronic and debilitating disease,” said Jian Sun Emba, CTTQ president. “Thus, there is a clear and urgent need to develop new, safe and effective treatments for HCV patients in China."

BioLineRx will grant CTTQ exclusive rights to develop, manufacture and commercialize BL-8030 in China and Hong Kong. CTTQ will pay BioLineRx an upfront license fee, plus future development, regulatory and commercialization milestones, for $30 million.

BioLineRx also has single-digit royalties on future sales of the drug and will retain the right to develop and commercialize BL-8030 in other parts of the world. BioLineRx will have access to development and regulatory data generated by CTTQ, as well as the right to use the data for commercialization and regulatory purposes outside China and Hong Kong.

"In parallel to collaborating with CTTQ to advance the drug, we intend to continue discussions with relevant partners for this project in other parts of the world," said Kinneret Savitsky, BioLineRx chief executive officer.