Eli Lilly and Company has acquired Austin-based neuroscience company 4E Therapeutics, which is developing a pipeline of orally available MNK inhibitors to treat chronic pain through a non-opioid approach.
4E’s technology targets the MNK-eIF4E signaling pathway in peripheral sensory neurons, seeking to provide pain relief without the central nervous system effects associated with many existing therapies. Its lead candidate, 4ET1103, became the first MNK inhibitor developed for pain treatment to enter human clinical trials and demonstrated a favorable safety profile in a Phase 1 study.
Founded to address the underlying neurological mechanisms of chronic pain, 4E is advancing programs targeting neuropathic pain, migraine, acute pain, and related conditions. The company’s medicinal chemistry and drug development efforts have been led by James Sahn, vice president of drug development, while CEO T. Craig Benson guided the company from its inception.
Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
Aquilo Partners served as exclusive financial advisor to 4E, while Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati provided legal counsel.
KEY QUOTES:
“We founded 4E Therapeutics with a simple but ambitious goal: to develop innovative, non-opioid therapies that address the underlying neurological mechanisms that cause pain. Lilly’s clinical development, translational, and global commercial capacity – and its deep commitment to tackling the challenges of chronic pain for patients – make it the right home for realizing the full potential of this work for patients.”
Joe Price, Co-Founder, President and Chairman of 4E Therapeutics
“Seeing this science – years of research into the molecular events that cause pain to become chronic – advance from basic research to clinical development and now to Lilly’s pipeline, provides excitement for the opportunity to accelerate new therapies to patients living with chronic pain.”
Theodore Price, Ph.D., Co-Founder of 4E Therapeutics and Director of the Center for Advanced Pain Studies at The University of Texas at Dallas
