Eli Lilly Commits $1.1 Billion to Revolutionary Gene Editing for Hearing Loss

2026-01-28 bio

Indianapolis, Wednesday, 28 January 2026.
Pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly has partnered with German biotech Seamless Therapeutics in a groundbreaking $1.12 billion deal to develop gene therapies for hereditary hearing disorders. The collaboration leverages Seamless’s innovative recombinase platform—a next-generation gene editing technology that precisely corrects DNA mutations without the limitations of CRISPR. This represents a major shift toward programmable enzyme-based treatments that could restore hearing in patients born with genetic hearing loss, addressing nearly half of all hearing disorders worldwide.

Innovation Category and Technology Foundation

This partnership represents a significant advance in healthtech and genetic medicine [GPT]. The collaboration announced on January 28, 2026, centers on Seamless Therapeutics’ proprietary recombinase platform, which enables precise DNA insertions independent of the cell’s natural DNA repair pathway [2]. Unlike CRISPR-based gene editing, recombinases are programmable enzymes that can precisely delete or insert large stretches of DNA without introducing additional mutations [3]. Seamless will design and program site-specific recombinases to correct specific gene mutations associated with hearing loss, while Lilly secures an exclusive license to advance the resulting therapies through preclinical development and beyond [1].

How Recombinase Technology Works

The recombinase platform represents a fundamental shift from traditional gene editing approaches [GPT]. Seamless CEO Albert Seymour explained that the company uses “a series of different models and bioinformatics to scan all the nucleotides in the region that they’re interested in” to identify areas similar to wild-type binding sites of these enzymes [8]. The technology reprograms two recombinase families: Cre and large serine recombinases [8]. What previously took two years in academic settings has been shortened to approximately six months using Seamless’s industrial-standard approach [8]. This efficiency enables the site-specific programming of recombinases to insert or exchange DNA fragments in gene sequences [1].

Company Locations and Financial Structure

Dresden, Germany-based Seamless Therapeutics launched in 2023 and maintains offices in both Dresden and Lexington, Massachusetts [8]. The company is a spinout of Technische Universität Dresden, commercializing discoveries by Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Frank Buchholz and Felix Lansing [8]. Under the agreement announced Wednesday, Seamless is eligible for over $1.12 billion in total payouts, including an upfront payment, R&D funding, development and commercial milestones, plus tiered royalties on products that reach the market [3][2]. The companies did not provide a detailed breakdown of the financial terms [1][3].

Addressing a Critical Medical Need

The collaboration targets a substantial unmet medical need, as almost half of all cases of hearing loss are due to genetic mutations [9]. Currently, there are no approved pharmacologic treatments designed to restore hearing [1]. This partnership builds upon Lilly’s existing hearing loss portfolio, which includes AK-OTOF, a gene therapy obtained through the $487 million acquisition of Akouos in October 2022 [3]. In January 2024, AK-OTOF demonstrated remarkable success by restoring hearing in an 11-year-old boy within 30 days of treatment, with the patient reaching normal hearing for some sound frequencies after suffering from profound hearing loss since birth [3]. Additionally, some 200,000 people globally have hearing loss linked to otoferlin mutations that AK-OTOF targets [3]. The Seamless partnership represents Lilly’s continued expansion in genetic medicine, following previous deals including a $1.3 billion agreement with Rznomics in May 2025 for RNA editing therapeutics [3][8] and the $1.3 billion acquisition of gene editing partner Verve Therapeutics [1].

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gene editing hearing loss