Roche is paying $20 million upfront for access to two degrader-antibody conjugate (DAC) programs from C4 Therapeutics, with more than $1 billion in milestones if those programs advance.
The deal extends a partnership dating to January 2016, when Roche backed C4T’s $73 million series A and signed its first degrader agreement, then worth over $750 million in potential milestones. For comparison: Merck KGaA put $16 million upfront and promised up to $740 million in milestones when it partnered with C4T in March 2024. Roche’s new deal is bigger on both counts.
What does Roche actually get? Two early-stage DAC programs against undisclosed oncology targets, plus an option for a third. C4T designs the degrader payload; Roche builds the antibody and runs everything from preclinical through commercialization. No peak-sales projections were disclosed, because the targets themselves weren’t.
DACs resemble antibody-drug conjugates but carry molecular glue degraders instead of cytotoxic payloads, forcing the interaction of two unrelated molecules to destroy a disease-causing protein. Bristol Myers Squibb bought Orum Therapeutics’ ORM-6151, a DAC for acute myeloid leukemia, for $100 million upfront in November 2025, suggesting the class commands real premiums.
Roche is committing to $1 billion-plus on a platform pointed at targets it won’t disclose. Whether that’s disciplined conviction or expensive optionality is the right question.
— Diana Kowalski