Sangamo bet on pharma collaborations, then partners left and revenue fell 77%

Sangamo Therapeutics, a genomic-medicine company founded in 1995 and public since 2000, recast itself in 2023 as a neurology-focused enterprise built on zinc-finger, AAV-capsid and MINT genome-editing platforms. Most of its revenue came from collaboration agreements and out-licensing royalties with larger pharmaceutical partners, not from a product it sold itself.

That dependence proved fatal. Novartis and Biogen terminated major collaborations in June 2023, and Pfizer ended its hemophilia A gene-therapy partnership, effective April 2025. Revenue fell from $176.2 million in 2023 to $57.8 million in 2024 and $39.6 million in 2025, a decline of more than 77%, while aggregate net losses exceeded $478 million over fiscal 2023–2025.

Sangamo had no funded debt at filing, but it had cash of only about $5.5 million, after raising roughly $100 million through stock sales in 2025 and early 2026 that was not enough. It filed a voluntary Chapter 11 petition in Delaware on June 23, 2026 to run a section 363 sale process rather than a balance-sheet restructuring, and identified stalking-horse transactions for its Fabry program and neurological technology-platform assets.

The asset sale divided the estate along clear lines: Eli Lilly took the platforms, prion program, intellectual property and out-licensing streams, and Astellas took the Fabry program. The company reduced its workforce from 128 to 77 full-time employees at filing, after earlier restructurings had already cut roughly 365 roles.

Revenue fell from $176.2M (2023) to $39.6M (2025), with over $478M in net losses; it had no funded debt but only ~$5.5M cash at filing.

Sangamo monetized through partnership and out-licensing revenue rather than through its own products, so partner decisions were existential.

Novartis and Biogen terminated collaborations in June 2023, and Pfizer ended its hemophilia A partnership effective April 2025.

With no approved product, revenue fell more than 77% from 2023 to 2025 and cumulative net losses exceeded $478M.

The biotech financing market contracted after the pandemic, so it could not raise enough — about $100M of stock sales — to bridge the gap.

It entered court with negligible cash and no debt, so there was nothing to restructure: only assets to sell.

A drug developer that depends on partner milestones rather than its own product revenue has no cushion when one collaboration ends. A few partners is a single point of failure, not a model.

Sangamo stayed in an asset-sale Chapter 11 as bidders disputed the terms of sale. Eli Lilly and Astellas were positioned as stalking-horse buyers for the platforms and the Fabry program, with an emergency hearing on the sale scheduled for August 28, 2026. The company's workforce fell to 77 full-time employees after the June reduction, leaving only staff identified by the buyers plus the team needed to administer the case. Shareholders were wiped out and creditors recovered from the asset sales.