Eyenovia Announces Development Collaboration with Formosa Pharmaceuticals

Eyenovia announced that the company has entered into a development collaboration agreement with Taiwan-based Formosa Pharmaceuticals that seeks to combine Eyenovia’s Optejet dispensing technology with Formosa’s APNT nanoparticle formulation platform for the potential development of new topical ophthalmic therapeutics that employ the Optejet dispenser.

Financial terms of the collaboration were not disclosed. 

Formosa’s proprietary APNT platform reduces an active pharmaceutical ingredient’s particle size with high uniformity and purity, thereby allowing penetration to relevant compartments in the eye, and ultimately enhancing bioavailability, according to an Eyenovia news release. This reduction in ingredient size may also expand the universe of existing and future drugs that could benefit from delivery using the Optejet.

“We have assembled a large and growing body of evidence demonstrating the many benefits of Optejet, including improved patient compliance and the achievement of therapeutic doses of medication with far less stress on the ocular surface than other forms of administration, such as standard eye drops,” Michael Rowe, Chief Executive Officer of Eyenovia, said in a company news release. “Through this development collaboration, we not only gain access to Formosa’s proven ophthalmic formulation expertise for further development using Optejet, but also its APNT formulation technology which opens up several new and large market indications for potential expansion of our own development pipeline. We look forward to a long and mutually beneficial partnership.”

Both companies stated that they intend to collaborate on testing formulations and engaging in discussions with the FDA, with the goal of executing a Development and Commercialization Agreement under which the companies would work to develop new drugs leveraging APNT formulations in the Optejet dispenser.