An Increased Spend, And Added Potential Arenas: New "Second Stage" Of Ginkgo/Merck Collab -- Potentially Nearly A Half-Billion Dollars To Ginkgo, Over A Decade...

This is very good news for Ginkgo -- and potentially for Merck as well, but it takes very dramatic advances to move the needle at Rahway, just as a function of Merck's overall size.

In any event, a little under a year ago, Ginkgo Bioworks announced an up to $500 million stock mix and match equity shelf offering, for longer term capital needs, along with a collab with US major Merck. At the time the funding was said to be worth around $144 million. Today, to help offset the decline in its share prices occasioned intermittent share issuances under the shelf, Ginkgo let it be known that the overall funding is now just north of $490 million, over about a decade -- if all milestones are met. Merck's added collab dollars signal a solid move, in tandem with a long term player.

Here's the latest bit [with my backgrounder from October 2022 here] -- at MarketWatch:

. . .Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings Inc. were rising more than 5% in Monday’s premarket trading after the company said it was collaborating with Merck & Co. Inc. on improvements in biologic manufacturing. Ginkgo plans to use its abilities in cell engineering, ultra high-throughput multiplexed screening, protein characterization and process optimization to boost yields and drive improvements in production efficiency.

The company is eligible to rake in an aggregate total of $490 million in upfront research fees, research milestone fees, option license payments and commercial milestone payments, according to its release. . . .

We’re thrilled to leverage our platform to improve the production of biologics in collaboration with Merck. In particular, we will utilize some of our unique capabilities, such as automated protocols to do predictive ultra high-throughput multiplexed screening, product characterization and process optimization. It’s exciting for our team to drive impactful and technically innovative work, and to do so shoulder-to-shoulder with our counterparts at Merck. . . .

Here Merck is also finding more environmentally friendly ways of getting from raw materials, to finished drugs and therapies. And to be certain, the roster of Ginkgo's existing collaborations already reads like a "who's who" of 21^st Century pharma. Now you know. . . onward, smiling.

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