Eli Lilly has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Orna Therapeutics, a biotechnology company developing in vivo cell therapies using engineered circular RNA (oRNA). Under the terms of the deal, Orna shareholders are eligible to receive up to USD 2.4 billion in cash, including an upfront payment and potential additional payments upon the achievement of specific clinical development milestones.

Orna's technology platform utilises fully engineered circular RNAs delivered via lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) to instruct a patient's own cells to produce therapeutic proteins, such as chimeric antigen receptors (CARs), inside the body. This approach aims to simplify manufacturing and enable more durable protein expression compared to traditional mRNA methods. The company's lead preclinical asset, ORN-252, is an in vivo CD19 CAR-T therapy intended for the treatment of B cell-driven autoimmune diseases.

PharmCube's NextBiopharm® database lists a total of five M&A transactions in the in vivo CAR-T space. Click here to request a free trial for NextBiopharm®.