CRISPR Therapeutics AG is a Swiss–American biotechnology company headquartered in

Zug Zug (Standard German: , Alemannic German: ; french: Zoug it, Zugo rm, Zug New Latin: ''Tugium'')named in the 16th century is the largest town and capital of the Swiss canton of Zug in Switzerland. Its name originates from the fishing vocabulary ...

, Switzerland. In fiscal year 2021, the company had revenues of $915 million, with net income of $378 million. By the end of the same year, the number of employees stood at 473. As of December 2021, the company had a market capitalization of over $6 billion. CRISPR Therapeutics' investors include German chemical company

Bayer Bayer AG (, commonly pronounced ; ) is a German multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology company and one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. Headquartered in Leverkusen, Bayer's areas of business include pharmaceutica ...

. The company operates R&D in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Greater Boston, Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most ...

History

CRISPR Therapeutics was founded in 2013 as Inception Genomics by

Emmanuelle Charpentier Emmanuelle Marie Charpentier (; born 11 December 1968) is a French professor and researcher in microbiology, genetics, and biochemistry. As of 2015, she has been a director at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin. In 2018, ...

, Shaun Foy and Rodger Novak. Charpentier later shared the

Nobel Prize in Chemistry ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...

in 2020 with

Jennifer Doudna Jennifer Anne Doudna (; born February 19, 1964) is an American biochemist who has done pioneering work in CRISPR gene editing, and made other fundamental contributions in biochemistry and genetics. Doudna was one of the first women to share a ...

. As part of a working group, she provided the first scientific documentation on the development and use of

CRISPR gene editing CRISPR gene editing (pronounced "crisper") is a genetic engineering technique in molecular biology by which the genomes of living organisms may be modified. It is based on a simplified version of the bacterial CRISPR-Cas9 antiviral defense syst ...

. This allows DNA to be specifically modified and exchanged, which can for example prevent diseases. The company CRISPR Therapeutics is to apply this new technology commercially and advance research. In 2016, the company went public on NASDAQ. In August 2016 the company started to operate Casebia Therapeutics, as a joint venture with Bayer. In 2019, Casebia Therapeutics came directly under the control of CRISPR Therapeutics.

Products

The company has several drugs in development. These include the drug CTX001 for the treatment of the rare blood disorders

Beta thalassemia Beta thalassemias (β thalassemias) are a group of inherited blood disorders. They are forms of thalassemia caused by reduced or absent synthesis of the beta chains of hemoglobin that result in variable outcomes ranging from severe anemia to cl ...

and

sickle cell disease Sickle cell disease (SCD) is a group of blood disorders typically inherited from a person's parents. The most common type is known as sickle cell anaemia. It results in an abnormality in the oxygen-carrying protein haemoglobin found in red b ...

, which is being developed jointly with

Vertex Pharmaceuticals Vertex Pharmaceuticals is an American biopharmaceutical company based in Boston, Massachusetts. It was one of the first biotech firms to use an explicit strategy of rational drug design rather than combinatorial chemistry. It maintains headqu ...

. In May 2020, CTX001 received

Orphan drug An orphan drug is a pharmaceutical agent developed to treat medical conditions which, because they are so rare, would not be profitable to produce without government assistance. The conditions are referred to as orphan diseases. The assignment o ...

Designation from the U.S.

Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the control and supervision of food ...

for transfusion-dependent beta thalassemia and from the European Medicines Agency for sickle cell disease and transfusion-dependent beta thalassemia. Early clinical trial results support the safety and efficacy of this treatment.

References

{{reflist, 30em Companies listed on the Nasdaq Swiss companies established in 2013 Biotechnology companies of Switzerland Companies based in Zug Genomics companies Biotechnology companies established in 2013 2013 establishments in Switzerland 2016 initial public offerings

History

Products

See also

References