Amgen is going ahead and adding Dark Blue to its tapestry, embedding the preclinical blood cancer program of U.K. biotech into its organization.
The California pharma has gone ahead and stitched together a deal of almost $840 million for Dark Blue Therapeutics, which is a private biotech based out of Oxford. The aim of the biotech is to come up with next-gen precision medicines as far as cancer is concerned.
Via the buyout, Amgen gets the investigational small molecule of Dark Blue that is crafted to target as well as degrade proteins named MLLT 1/3, which can go ahead and drive certain forms of acute myeloid leukemia – AML. The program is at present in preclinical studies, which are made use of to request entry within human testing, as per the online pipeline of the biotech.
It is well to be noted that the preclinical leukemia data through the preclinical blood cancer program when it comes to the unnamed asset went on to demonstrate anti-cancer activity as well as mechanistic differentiation from the present therapies that are available, as per a January 6, 2026 release that announced the deal.
Apparently, the small molecule degrader is indeed Dark Blue’s most advanced candidate and is meant to offer its services as both monotherapy and combination therapy for those patients having AML and solid cancers. The hope is that preclinical blood cancer program can very well overcome the treatment resistance and at the same time enhance the remission durability.
Jay Bradner, M.D., the head of R&D at Amgen, said that acute myeloid leukemia goes on to remain as one of the most challenging cancers to be treated, and they do see an immediate need for new mechanisms that are capable of changing the trajectory of this disease.
He further adds that this acquisition goes on to complement and also extend their research in targeted protein degradation and leukemia therapeutics, thereby advancing their strategy to invest early within rising medicines as far as novel therapeutic targets are concerned.
Interestingly, Dark Blue also touts a basket of discovery, or even earlier-stage protein degraders for that matter, that are designed to be the first-in-class cancer treatments. The biotech is anticipated to be woven into the existing research organization of Amgen.
Dark Blue, which was founded in 2020, happened to be built upon the foundation of cancer biology science, which was spun out from the University of Oxford. Alastair MacKinnon, the CEO, was the co-founder as well as the former chief medical officer of Mereo Biopharma, which is a London-based biopharma that is focused on rare disease treatments.
