MRK vs NXTC

Merck & Company Inc.

Merck & Co., Inc. operates as a healthcare company worldwide. It operates through two segments, Pharmaceutical and Animal Health segments. The Pharmaceutical segment offers human health pharmaceutical products in the areas of oncology, hospital acute care, immunology, neuroscience, virology, cardiovascular, diabetes, and women's health, as well as vaccine products. The Animal Health segment provides discovers, develops, manufactures, and markets a range of veterinary pharmaceuticals, vaccines, and health management solutions and services, as well as a suite of digitally connected identification, traceability, and monitoring products. The company has collaborations with AstraZeneca PLC; Bayer AG; Eisai Co., Ltd.; and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics. It serves drug wholesalers and retailers, hospitals, and government agencies; managed health care providers, such as health maintenance organizations, pharmacy benefit managers, and other institutions; and physicians and physician distributors, veterinarians, and animal producers. The company has collaboration agreement with Gilead Sciences, Inc. to co-develop and co-commercialize long-acting investigational treatment combinations of Lenacapavir and Islatravir in HIV; Amathus Therapeutics to develop treatments for neurodegenerative diseases; and Linnaeus Therapeutics, Inc. to evaluate LNS8801 in combination with KEYTRUDA for patients with advanced cancer. It also has a collaboration with Biomed X Gmbh for building on ongoing research projects in the fields of oncology (DNA damage response and RNA splicing) and autoimmunity (intestinal epithelial barrier in autoimmune diseases); and a collaboration agreement with NGM Biopharmaceuticals, Inc. to focus primarily on the development of novel medicines for unmet patient needs in retinal and CVM diseases, including heart failure. Merck & Co., Inc. was founded in 1891 and is headquartered in Kenilworth, New Jersey.

NextCure Inc.

NextCure, Inc., a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, engages in discovering and developing novel immunomedicines to treat cancer and other immune-related diseases by restoring normal immune function. Its lead product candidate is NC318, which is in Phase II clinical trials for the treatment of advanced or metastatic solid tumors. The company is also developing NC410, which is in Phase I for novel immunomedicine designed to block immune suppression mediated by an immune modulator called Leukocyte-Associated Immunoglobulin-like Receptor 1; and NC762, an immunomedicine targeting a molecule called human B7 homolog 4 protein, or B7-H4. Its discovery and research programs include an antibody in preclinical evaluation of other potential novel immunomodulatory molecules. NextCure, Inc. has a license agreement with Yale University. The company was incorporated in 2015 and is headquartered in Beltsville, Maryland.