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PerkinElmer Collaborates With Leading Life Science Incubators LabCentral and MBC BioLabs to Help Further Drug Discovery

On October 14, 2021 PerkinElmer, Inc. a global leader committed to innovating for a healthier world, reported it is collaborating with leading life science incubators LabCentral in Boston, Massachusetts and MBC BioLabs in San Francisco, California to provide innovative, drug discovery technologies, expertise and training to help pharma and biotech start-ups more quickly and accurately identify and accelerate potential clinical trial candidates (Press release, PerkinElmer, OCT 14, 2021, View Source [SID1234591399]).

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HOW: The PerkinElmer technologies to be used at both dynamic springboard communities will help optimize scientific workflows. These will include the LabChip GXII Touch system, which allows for protein characterization in as little as 42 seconds and requires minimal sample prep, and the MuviCyteTM Live Cell Imaging System, with three-color fluorescence imaging and multiple movie modes, optimal cell maintenance support and flexible assay performance.

LabCentral and MBC BioLabs will also use the Victor NIVO plate reader, the industry’s most compact plate reader supporting all popular detection modes, and the Envision Multimode Plate Reader, along with reagents from PerkinElmer’s extensive portfolio. In addition, at LabCentral, PerkinElmer’s Nexcelom Celigo Image Cytometer, a multichannel brightfield and fluorescent imaging technology for 2D and 3D cultures, and Cellaca MX High-throughput Cell Counter, which processes 24 samples with fluorescence in 2.5 minutes or less, will be employed.

These innovative additions join other PerkinElmer technologies already at work at one or both of the communities, including cell line engineering, siRNA, and shRNA solutions and reagents from Horizon Discovery and Cellometer Auto 2000 Cell Viability Counter systems from Nexcelom.

WHY: Commenting on the expanding collaboration with the leading incubators, Alan Fletcher, Ph.D., senior vice president, life science at PerkinElmer, said, "Getting leading edge drug discovery technologies and best practices into the hands of up-and-coming organizations is an exciting way to further new thinking around how to treat and prevent the world’s most challenging diseases and viruses. We are thrilled to be involved with both the MBC BioLabs and LabCentral communities as their scientists and business teams work to bubble-up novel technologies and breakthrough drug candidates to improve human health."

Douglas Crawford, Ph.D., co-founder and general manager, MBC BioLabs, added, "We are committed to helping startups quickly generate vital data and thrilled to collaborate with PerkinElmer to bring state-of-the-art equipment to the 100+ companies in our labs. These research tools enable our companies to move swiftly from concept to results."

Johannes Fruehauf, MD, PhD, co-founder, president, LabCentral, also said, "The innovations and expertise PerkinElmer is bringing to LabCentral will further enable our resident companies in the development of their ground-breaking life science technologies and drug discovery work. We are excited to welcome PerkinElmer to our network, expanding on the dynamic cell and gene technologies already in action here from Nexcelom and Horizon Discovery."

MORE: From research to clinical trials and the manufacturing of new drugs and vaccines, PerkinElmer is helping scientists accelerate the discovery-to-commercialization process. To learn more about PerkinElmer’s life sciences efforts around the globe, please visit: View Source

MiNK Therapeutics, Inc. Announces Pricing of Initial Public Offering

On October 14, 2021 MiNK Therapeutics, Inc. ("MiNK"), a clinical stage biotechnology company pioneering the discovery, development, and commercialization of allogeneic, off-the-shelf, invariant natural killer T (iNKT) cell therapies to treat cancer and other immune-mediated diseases, reported the pricing of its initial public offering of 3,333,334 shares of common stock at a public offering price of $12.00 per share (Press release, MiNK Therapeutics, OCT 14, 2021, View Source [SID1234591396]). The gross proceeds of the offering, before deducting underwriting discounts and commissions and other offering expenses payable by MiNK, are expected to be approximately $40 million. The shares are expected to begin trading on the Nasdaq Global Market on October 15, 2021 under the ticker symbol "INKT." The offering is expected to close on or about October 19, 2021, subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions. In addition, MiNK has granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 500,000 shares of common stock at the initial public offering price, less underwriting discounts and commissions. All of the shares are being offered by MiNK.

Evercore ISI and William Blair are acting as joint book-running managers for the offering. B. Riley and Baird are acting as co-managers for the offering.

A registration statement relating to the offering of these securities has been filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and became effective on October 14, 2021. The offering is being made only by means of a prospectus, copies of which may be obtained from Evercore Group L.L.C., Attention: Equity Capital Markets, 55 East 52nd Street, 35th Floor, New York, New York 10055, or by telephone at (888) 474-0200, or by email at [email protected] and William Blair & Company, L.L.C., Attention: Prospectus Department, 150 North Riverside Plaza, Chicago, Illinois 60606, or by telephone at (800) 621-0687, or by email at [email protected]. Copies of the final prospectus, when available, related to the offering will be available at www.sec.gov.

This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy these securities, nor shall there be any sale of these securities in any state or jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state or jurisdiction.

GV20 Oncotherapy Completes Series B Financing to Advance Pipeline into the Clinic and Expand Immuno-Oncology Drug Discovery Platform

On October 14, 2021 GV20 Oncotherapy, a biotechnology company with unique expertise in novel target identification and antibody drug discovery in immuno-oncology, reported the completion of its Series B financing (Press release, GV20 Oncotherapy, OCT 14, 2021, View Source [SID1234591395]). This round of financing was led by Coatue Management, with participation from existing investors IDG Capital, 3W Investment, Watson Capital, Linear Capital, and additional investors.

"GV20" is the acupuncture point on top of the head, implying the company’s goal of finding cancer vulnerabilities. The company was cofounded in 2016 by Shirley Liu, a Professor at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Ted Xiao, a former postdoctoral fellow at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School. GV20 Oncotherapy applies novel genomics and AI techniques to accelerate antibody drug discovery and development for cancer immunotherapy. Over the last few years, GV20 has built a proprietary genetic screening and functional genomics platform for target identification. In addition, the company has established a proprietary AI platform to de novo design fully-human functional antibodies with favorable developability profiles, allowing time and cost-efficient antibody drug discovery. Combining the power of these two technology platforms, GV20 has built a solid antibody drug portfolio against novel and challenging targets. "It is a very exciting time with high-throughput genomics, AI and cancer immunology converging on GV20 Oncotherapy. We believe our platforms have demonstrated unique capabilities to identify potent antibodies against multiple targets. We are well-poised to crack the antibody drug discovery code and bring effective immunotherapy drugs to cancer patients," said Shirley Liu.

Proceeds from this financing will be predominantly used to advance GV20 Oncotherapy’s lead antibody program into the clinic in the coming year while expanding its drug discovery portfolio against additional immune-oncology targets. The lead antibody program is directed against a novel immunotherapy target where internal pre-clinical studies have demonstrated remarkable in vivo efficacy as a single-agent as well as in combination with established immunotherapy. GV20 intends to develop select additional clinical antibody candidates through external biopharmaceutical collaborations. Kai Jiang, Partner at Coatue, commented "The progress made by GV20 demonstrates the company’s ability to rapidly identify novel targets and fully-human functionally efficacious antibodies, and initiate development to anticipated clinical trials. GV20 is poised to become a technology leader in antibody discovery research and immunotherapy drug development in the coming years."

About Coatue

Coatue is one of the largest technology investment platforms in the world with over $40 billion in assets under management. Coatue’s dedicated team of engineers and data scientists work closely with investment professionals to add value to founders and executive teams in our portfolio. With venture, growth and public funds, Coatue backs entrepreneurs from around the globe and at every stage of growth. Some of Coatue’s private investments in healthcare includes Caris Life Sciences, Singular Genomics, other cases include Airtable, Ant Financial, Anaplan, ByteDance, Chime, Databricks, DoorDash, Instacart, Meituan, Snap, Snowflake and Spotify.

Brooklyn ImmunoTherapeutics to
Move Stock Exchange Listing to Nasdaq

On October 14, 2021 Brooklyn ImmunoTherapeutics, Inc. (NYSE American: BTX) ("Brooklyn"), a biopharmaceutical company focused on exploring the role that cytokine and gene editing/cell therapy can have in treating patients with cancer, blood disorders, and monogenic diseases, reported it will transfer its common stock listing from the NYSE American to the Nasdaq Global Market, effective upon the market close on October 22, 2021 (Press release, Brooklyn ImmunoTherapeutics, OCT 14, 2021, View Source [SID1234591394]). Brooklyn’s common stock is expected to begin trading as a Nasdaq-listed security on October 25, 2021 and will continue to trade under the ticker symbol "BTX."

Brooklyn’s President and CEO Howard J. Federoff, M.D., Ph.D., commented, "We view the Nasdaq Global Market as more in line with the innovation we are pursuing, which we believe will be attractive to a broader range of investors oriented around companies such as ours. We view this transfer as driving further shareholder value for our investors. We thank the New York Stock Exchange for its partnership, and are extremely pleased to join many of the world’s most successful and innovative companies listed on Nasdaq."

Telix’s MTRs are Advancing the Field of Precision Radio-Oncology

On October 14, 2021 Telix Pharmaceuticals reported that radiation therapy is regaining a foothold in oncology (Press release, Telix Pharmaceuticals, OCT 14, 2021, View Source [SID1234591392]). This isn’t the therapy your parents remember, though. Modern radiation therapy is tightly targeted to dramatically reduce toxicity and side effects and often can be administered on an outpatient basis.

"There’s a lot of innovation in this field," Bernard Lambert, Ph.D., president and chief operating officer for Telix Pharmaceuticals (U.S.) told BioSpace. Telix’s own program is a case in point. The company has molecularly-targeted radiation (MTR) products under development or under review by the regulatory authorities for imaging and therapy. Telix has programs from preclinical to Phase III underway, as well as one imaging agent in final review at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

"MTR molecules are a concept of precision and personalized medicine," Lambert said. "Rather than flooding the body with radiation and killing healthy cells in addition to tumors, we can selectively target the tumor (and tumor supportive cells) and deliver the radioisotope directly to it, saving healthy cells and, therefore, reduce the side effects."

At a basic level, Telix attaches a radioactive isotope to a small molecule or antibody that targets the surface antigen on cancer cells. Once in the body, these molecules home-in on the cancer cell and deliver their radioactive payload, killing only the cancer cell. The decay rate varies from an hour or two to several days.

What really sets Telix apart from its competitors in this space, Lambert said, is that "we are covering a different stage of clinical development. Many (other companies) are in preclinical development. Telix, in contrast, is a pioneer in the industry. Our portfolio ranges from commercial to preclinical products in several indications, but mainly in oncology." Notably, the same MTR platform can be used therapeutically to treat multiple indications by changing the delivery molecule. The platform also can deliver lower-energy radioisotopes for imaging, which can be used to determine treatment effectiveness or to stage cancer treatments.

Currently, the company is prioritizing prostate, kidney, brain and bone-marrow cancers, and just dosed its first patient in a Phase II triple-negative breast cancer trial studying TLX250-CDx (89Zr-DFO-girentuximab) in France. "That particular trial targets an antigen, carbonic anhydrase IX (CA9), that is overexpressed in patients with renal cell carcinoma," he said, as well as lung and oesophageal cancers.

The breast cancer study, led by Caroline Rousseau at the Institut de Cancérologie de l’Ouest (ICO) in St. Herblain, France, evaluates how CA9 imaging and positron emission tomography can be used to diagnose triple-negative breast cancer (a particularly aggressive form of cancer with high unmet need) and to stage treatments. It is the second in a series of studies evaluating CA9 as a target for cancers beyond renal cell carcinoma.

Other programs targeting CA9 are in a Phase II therapeutic study for renal cell carcinoma and a Phase III imaging study for that indication. A separate study is underway in bladder cancer.

The side effects of MTR products vary depending on the molecule Telix uses, but Lambert said, "our safety profile is quite better than with chemotherapy, although like any of the drugs, it has some side effects, such as headaches, vomiting and pain at the injection point. They’re manageable."

"Historically, radiation therapy was used at the end of the patient journey to extend the patient’s life when everything else had failed. Yet, research is showing it works well as a front-line treatment," Lambert said. "It can’t be used for every tumor type, but it does address a lot of unmet needs and contribute to patients’ quality of life." The challenge is convincing physicians that it can be used effectively as an early-stage treatment.

There’s another challenge, too: Delivering products with very short half-lives to patients throughout the U.S. and Europe. "We need a high level of coordination with our manufacturers in the U.S. and Europe," Lambert pointed out. To manage the logistical hurdles, Telix is working with Cardinal Health and other radiopharmacy networks to ensure the products are near radiologic imaging centers. It is also establishing manufacturing sites in the U.S. and Europe.

In terms of upcoming milestones, Lambert said he is anticipating what he hopes will be FDA approval for TLX591-CDx, Telix’s prostate imaging product, and then submitting TLX250-CDx, its kidney cancer imaging product, for review. "We have a therapeutic program that’s active for prostate and kidney cancers, too," he said. Telix also is planning to meet with the FDA to bring its glioblastoma product to Phase II/III trials that he anticipates will occur in 2022.