On May 27, 2026 HCW Biologics Inc. (the "Company") (NASDAQ: HCWB), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing first-in-class fusion immunotherapeutics for autoimmune diseases, cancer, and senescence-associated dysplasia, reported that it has exercised its option to regain full ex vivo rights to HCW9206 and HCW9201, two commercial-ready compounds as reagents, from its licensee, Wugen Inc. Wugen held exclusive worldwide rights to these two compounds for ex vivo, cell-based therapy applications. The Company acquired these rights for no cost and retained the nonrefundable upfront license fee, including 2.2 million shares of Wugen common stock.
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Recent data published in the high-impact, peer-reviewed journal, Science Advances, indicate that HCW9206, the Company’s proprietary, commercial-ready multi-cytokine fusion protein reagent, may offer a novel, cost-effective approach to producing CAR-T cells with enhanced function for immunotherapy (see link number 1 for full article below). As a first-in-class cytokine-scaffold platform, HCW9206 has the potential to improve manufacturing efficiency while supporting the development of more potent CAR-T therapies at lower costs.
HCW9206 has the advantage of generating a CAR-T population which is markedly enriched for long-lived T-memory stem ("Tscm") cells, which are rare, highly proliferative, and self-renewing cells. Results from a recent, third-party clinical trial in patients with blood cancer demonstrated that a more defined CAR-T product, enriched with Tscm, persists longer in the body and achieves complete remissions at low doses—without the need for chemotherapy pre-conditioning (see link number 2 to full article below). The Company believes that these results support its perspective that utilizing HCW9206 as part of a manufacturing process may be broadly applicable to increase persistence and functionality of CAR-T therapy.
Dr. Hing C. Wong, the Company’s Founder and CEO, stated, "We are excited to regain the full commercial rights for ex vivo use of HCW9206 and HCW9201. We have a great opportunity to develop Tscm-based CAR-T approaches to benefit patients with blood cancer, solid tumors or autoimmune diseases, through partnerships with larger companies who are focused on CAR-T therapies."
Dr. Wong continued, "HCW9206 is a novel compound that allows a single molecule to deliver synergistic signals from three immune-stimulating cytokines. It is versatile and has demonstrated activity in generating large quantities of memory-like NK cells for cancer cell therapy in a GMP manufacturing scale (see link number 3 to full article below). We have also found that it may enhance CAR-T manufacturing as a promising new reagent with the potential to improve production processes. In addition, experimental models show that HCW9206 may improve the function and persistence of CAR-T cells following adoptive transfer for treatment of infectious disease and cancer, a goal the industry has been pursuing for the past decade."
(Press release, HCW Biologics, MAY 27, 2026, View Source [SID1234666097])