On December 1, 2015 Adaptimmune Therapeutics plc (Nasdaq: ADAP), a leader in the use of TCR engineered T-cell therapy to treat cancer, and Seattle-based Universal Cells Inc., a genome editing company developing universal donor stem cells, reported that they have entered into a collaboration and exclusive license agreement for the development of allogeneic T-cell therapies (Press release, Adaptimmune, DEC 1, 2015, View Source [SID:1234508368]). Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo! With Universal Cells’ proprietary gene editing technology, Adaptimmune intends to develop affinity enhanced donor T-cells that are universally applicable. The enhanced T-cell technology involves selective engineering of cell surface proteins (TCRs and class I and class II HLA proteins), without the use of nucleases, to develop universal T-cell products. Adaptimmune and Universal Cells are planning to develop these off-the-shelf allogeneic affinity-enhanced T-cell therapeutics to treat large patient populations.
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"This collaboration marks another step towards our goal of providing innovative immunotherapeutics to patients suffering from cancer," said Dr. Helen Tayton-Martin, Adaptimmune’s Chief Operating Officer.
"Our proprietary platform for TCR identification, affinity enhancement and safety testing is already best in class, and we set high standards for collaborations. We believe that Universal Cells’ platform for generating universal donor cells is also best in class and provides us with a great opportunity to test the feasibility of a longer term allogeneic product, thus allowing large numbers of patients to be treated from a single cell line."
"We are very excited about working with Adaptimmune. By partnering with the world leader in TCR engineered T-cell immunotherapies, we are poised to develop a scalable, safe, and efficacious product with the potential to revolutionize cancer immunotherapy," said Claudia Mitchell, Chief Executive Officer of Universal Cells. "This partnership will combine Universal Cells’ nuclease-free genome editing platform with Adaptimmune’s unique expertise in TCR engineering to develop a first-in-class therapeutic product based on our universal donor cells."
Under the terms of the agreement, Universal Cells will grant to Adaptimmune an exclusive, sublicensable, worldwide license to use, sell, supply, manufacture, import, and develop products and services utilizing Universal Cells’ technology within the T-cell immunotherapy field. Universal Cells will receive an upfront license and start-up fee of $5.5 million, and will be eligible for up to $41 million in milestone payments for certain development and product milestones. Universal Cells would also receive a profit-share payment for the first product, and royalties on sales of other products utilizing its technology.
Month: December 2015
ImmunoCellular Therapeutics Establishes Agreement with EORTC for ICT-107 Phase 3 Registrational Trial in Glioblastoma
On December 1, 2015 ImmunoCellular Therapeutics, Ltd. ("ImmunoCellular") (NYSE MKT: IMUC) reported the establishment of an agreement with the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) for the phase 3 registrational trial of ICT-107 in patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma (GBM) (Press release, ImmunoCellular Therapeutics, DEC 1, 2015, View Source [SID:1234508367]). Schedule your 30 min Free 1stOncology Demo! The EORTC contributed to the trial design and will assist ImmunoCellular Therapeutics in facilitating accrual of patients for this trial in Europe.
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Prof. Michael Weller of the University Hospital Zurich, Chair of the EORTC Brain Tumor Group, and coordinator of this study commented "The EORTC is a leader in enabling multi-disciplinary approaches to investigate strategic therapeutic questions through clinical and translational research. We aim to improve the understanding of disease and help advance innovative therapies in cancer care for the benefit of patients. We are pleased to collaborate with ImmunoCellular to conduct the phase 3 registrational trial of ICT-107, a potentially promising cancer immunotherapeutic approach to treating brain cancer."
"Working with the EORTC is a key step in our strategy to establish a network of relationships within the clinical oncology community to support the conduct of the ICT-107 Phase 3 trial," said Andrew Gengos, ImmunoCellular’s Chief Executive Officer. "For several months, we have been working with prominent cancer cooperative groups in the US and Europe to refine and finalize the trial design, gain their endorsement and secure their help in executing a high quality trial. With EORTC’s support, we believe that we can access large numbers of affiliated trial sites which will facilitate patient accrual. We anticipate patient enrollment in the phase 3 trial to begin within the next few weeks."