Swedish pharmaceutical company Camurus (STO:CAMX) and US-based Eli Lilly and Company (NYSE:LLY) announced on Tuesday that they have entered a collaboration and licence agreement which grants Lilly exclusive, worldwide rights to the research, development, manufacture and commercialisation of long-acting incretin products for cardiometabolic health based on Camurus' FluidCrystal technology.

The agreement comprises up to four Lilly proprietary drug compounds.

"We are pleased to enter into this collaboration with Lilly to bring innovative long-acting treatment options to people living with obesity, diabetes and other serious chronic diseases," said Fredrik Tiberg, Camurus president & CEO, CSO. "Through the collaboration with Lilly, a global leader in the metabolic disease area, we leverage our FluidCrystal technology in rapidly expanding indication areas impacting hundreds of millions of people, while maintaining our own commercial focus on CNS and rare diseases."

In return for granting Lilly the licence to use the FluidCrystal technology for the selected incretin drug compounds for cardiometabolic health, Camurus is eligible to receive up to USD290m in upfront, development and regulatory milestone payments as well as USD580m in sales-based milestone payments and tiered mid-single digit royalties on global net product sales.