Ceva and Touchlight entered into an agreement and a long-term collaboration for the development and manufacture of new dbDNA vaccines and therapeutics across a broad range of animal health indications.
Libourne and London, 17 January 2025 – B P Collins LLP has acted for Ceva Animal Health (Ceva), the 5th largest global animal health company, in its deal with Touchlight to secure the rights to develop and manufacture future products using Touchlight’s dbDNA technology across the animal health field.
B P Collins’ corporate team, led by partner Alex Zachary and supported by senior associate, Victoria Taylor, and solicitors, Holly McNeil and Stella Seimeni, was assisted by employment associate, Greg Clark.
Under the stewardship of Dr Ian Thompson, a global leader in vaccines, Ceva and Touchlight will pursue a broad-ranging development programme to bring innovative DNA vaccine products to market for animal health. While the financial terms of the deal remain undisclosed, the agreement includes an upfront payment, development milestones and royalties on sales of commercialised products.
The partnership brings together the world-leading development and commercialisation capability of Ceva with Touchlight’s best-in-class dbDNA technology which enables rapid, high purity enzymatic DNA production and eliminates antibiotic resistance genes.
Stonehaven Transactions (the transactions advisory arm of Stonehaven) acted as strategic adviser to Touchlight in relation to the deal, and Arnold & Porter acted as legal adviser. In addition to B P Collins, Ceva was also assisted by Ernst and Young.
Ceva Chairman and CEO Marc Prikazsky remarked “This is an exciting technology that will complement very well our innovation in nucleic acid vaccines pipeline. Touchlight’s unique expertise in synthetic DNAs and protein designs together with Ceva’s leadership in development and manufacturing of animal vaccines, being the first company to have launched an RNA vaccine for avian flu, will support the development of effective novel technology vaccines that are so much needed by the industry.”
Alex Zachary, corporate and commercial partner, B P Collins added “We are extremely proud to have supported our longstanding client, Ceva, on this significant transaction, which could result in considerable advancements in the field of animal vaccines and therapeutic treatments.”
Touchlight Founder and Executive Chair, Jonny Ohlson said “This deal is the product of an extremely successful collaboration between Touchlight and Stonehaven, and in Ceva we have found a partner with the ambition, entrepreneurialism and insight required to take dbDNA products forward within animal health. We are excited that we can deploy our industry-leading dbDNA technology in such a broad ranging programme.”
