It is one of the windiest days in late summer, and the wind is blowing especially hard to the north at the Medicon Village campus where the Department of Immunotechnology and the cancer centre CREATE Health are located. But head of the department and director Carl Borrebaeck is tranquillity personified – although the word “insane” does manage to slip his tongue when he talks about all the congratulations that have been pouring in through emails and social media ever since the major deal was struck.

The deal involves SEK 6 billion paid by the U.S. pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson to one of Carl Borrebaeck’s companies, Alligator AB, to conduct work on this attractive antibody, until it hits the market. It is presently in the initial stage, and is part of a test conducted on some 40 patients. Carl Borrebaeck is a board member and shareholder of Alligator – the company which he founded in 2001 and which currently employs 25 researchers.

“This licensing agreement is a huge boost for the company, which can now continue to develop other projects”, he says.

For Carl Borrebaeck this means, with almost one hundred percent certainty, that he will have ample outlet for his drive as a researcher:

“My main driving force is knowing that what I do will benefit others”, he says.

Carl Borrebaeck has always worked towards bringing his research out into society. He started his first company in 1983, BioInvent AB, which coincided with the establishment of the Ideon Science Park in Lund. The favourable infrastructure gave Bioinvent many good years, but Carl Borrebaeck has now left the company. He also founded, and is still active in, Immunovia AB and SenzaGen AB, which along with Alligator are located at Medicon Village.

In 1990, Carl Borrebaeck launched the Department of Immunotechnology which has over the years produced more than 55 PhDs. In 2006, together with his research coordinator, he initiated the cancer centre CREATE Health with research groups from both the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Medicine. He is the head of some 60 people, and when asked about how he makes time for everything, he smiles and says that you just have to work a little harder.

“The fact is that if you get to work with people that you care about in an environment where you feel comfortable, it’s not hard. I rarely feel stressed and I enjoy major projects such as CREATE Health.”

Then of course you have to have an in with the funders, and Carl Borrebaeck has pulled in a lot of money for his various projects.

“To be able to convert these concepts, you need to package them a certain way – explain what it’s about so that people understand. I was not very good at it in the beginning, but now I’ve learned.”

However, he would like to see the research councils, as well as the research community in general, become better at prioritising, and making larger investments in a few selected areas rather than “smearing” allocations on many small projects.

“This would benefit both established and junior researchers”, he says.

So what has Lund University and the surrounding infrastructure meant for Carl Borrebaeck’s research, his four companies, and the now historic licensing agreement worth SEK 6 billion? At first, he is almost unable to answer the question, but then refers to his colleagues – not least the opportunity to pick them – and he praises the working environment at Medicon Village, where he and his research groups moved a couple of years ago. This is also where Alligator has been able to develop while the researchers were working on the successful antibody which had been mothballed for some years.

“We developed the antibody in connection with a major EU programme about the disease MS. We found that it could not be used in that context, and so I put it away for future projects.”

Then came the research field of immune oncology. Alligator became interested in continuing the development of the antibody, and bought the rights to it from BioInvent in 2014. The Danish venture capital corporation Sunstone Capital is currently an Alligator shareholder, and played an active part in securing the mayor financial licensing agreement with Johnson & Johnson.

What happens now – does Carl Borrebaeck have more aces up his sleeve?

“Oh sure, there are other potential six billion crown projects out there”, he says with a smile.

FACTS about the antibody:

The antibody is the basis of immunostimulatory cancer treatment and it operates in the so-called ADC-1013 molecule. It goes in and reactivates the body’s own immune system so that it can detect and fight the cancer. Moreover, the treatment can provide long-lasting immunity against that type of cancer. The types of cancer for which the treatment is expected to be most effective is advanced malignant melanoma and lung cancer. The treatment can also be used for breast and prostate cancer.