Spark Therapeutics ($ONCE) is trading roughly $15 million in cash and stock to buy out one of its partners, picking up Genable Technologies and its candidate for a rare vision disorder. Under the agreement, Spark paid $6 million in cash and 265,000 of its own shares to absorb the Irish biotech, following a collaboration agreement signed in 2014. Genable has been using Spark's in-house gene therapy technology to develop a candidate called RhoNova, designed to treat the genetic defect behind rhodopsin-linked autosomal dominant retinitis pigmentosa, an orphan disease that can result in blindness. Genable's treatment has demonstrated promising results in preclinical studies, Spark said, and the company plans to push it into clinical trials. More
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