The companies will jointly fund the study that is expected to begin in 2013.
Phase 2 proof-of-concept study is designed to estimate the safety profile, tolerability profile and viral cure rates of 12-week combination of VX-135 and GSK2336805.
Vertex senior vice president and chief medical officer Robert Kauffman said the agreement underscores the company’s commitment to develop all-oral treatment regimens for people with hepatitis C using medicines within our own pipeline and by working in collaboration with other companies like GSK.
"We are focused on the development of new all-oral treatments for hepatitis C that have the potential to provide a high cure rate with only 12 weeks of treatment, and we look forward to the start of this study with GSK," Kauffman added.
Vertex’s uridine nucleotide analogue pro-drug VX-135, is designed to target the NS5B polymerase thereby restraining hepatitis C viral replication.
GSK is developing GSK2336805 as an investigational NS5A replication complex inhibitor to treat hepatitis C.