T3 Pharmaceuticals AG is being acquired by Boehringer Ingelheim for up to 450 million Swiss francs. With T3 Pharma, the German pharmaceutical group, which has a branch in Basel, is acquiring a clinical-stage biotech company based on the main campus of the Switzerland Innovation Park Basel Area in Allschwil in the canton of Basel-Landschaft. During its launch seven years ago, it was supported by the startup accelerator and incubator BaseLaunch. According to a statement, T3’s activities will remain in the Basel Area.

T3 Pharma, a spin-off of the University of Basel, has developed a therapeutic platform that uses live bacteria to deliver immunomodulatory proteins into cancer cells and tumor microenvironments. Boehringer Ingelheim describes this bacterial cancer therapy as groundbreaking. “This will bring us closer to achieving our vision of driving a paradigm shift in cancer care treatments,” said Michel Pairet, Member of the Board of Managing Directors at Boehringer Ingelheim with responsibility for the Innovation Unit, in the statement.

Second acquisition of Boehringer in Basel

The T3 Pharma team is excited to continue and accelerate “the successful development of our bacterial delivery platform as part of Boehringer Ingelheim,” according to CEO Simon Ittig. He said: “Being integrated with our partners at Boehringer will enable us to realize the full potential of our platform to fight solid cancers.”

In 2020, Boehringer acquired NBE-Therapeutics, a Basel-based life sciences company. The purchase price at the time was €1.18 billion.