By Michael Dabaie

BeyondSpring Inc. shares were up 17% to $29.53 after the pharmaceutical company unveiled a commercialization and co-development agreement with Jiangsu Hengrui Pharmaceuticals.

The agreement with Jiangsu Hengrui is in the Greater China area for BeyondSpring's investigational drug candidate plinabulin. Plinabulin in combination with G-CSF is currently under review by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the China National Medical Products Administration to prevent chemotherapy-induced neutropenia. The territory for the agreement includes mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.

Wanchunbulin, BeyondSpring's 58%-owned subsidiary in China, will partner with Hengrui in China. Wanchunbulin will get up to 1.3 billion yuan, or about $200 million, in milestone payments. This would include CNY200 million, or about $30 million, upfront and up to CNY1.1 billion, or $170 million, in regulatory and sales milestone payments.

Wanchunbulin will book revenue and to pay for 100% cost of goods sold and Hengrui will pay for 100% of the commercialization costs for plinabulin in the territory and receive a pre-determined percentage of net sales.

Wanchunbulin and Hengrui will co-develop additional indications for plinabulin in the territory, the company said.

Hengrui will also make a CNY100 million, or about $15 million, equity investment in Wanchunbulin.

Write to Michael Dabaie at michael.dabaie@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

08-26-21 1404ET