On February 6, 2020 Valo Therapeutics Limited (Valo Tx), an immuno-oncology company developing tumour antigen-coated oncolytic viruses as therapeutic vaccines, reported that it had received additional funding, triggered by positive pre-clinical data, to progress its PeptiCRAd platform into first-in-human clinical trials (Press release, Valo Therapeutics, FEB 6, 2020, View Source [SID1234553975]). The in-vivo data demonstrated a synergistic improvement in tumour clearance when checkpoint inhibitors were combined with Valo Tx’s platform.
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Dr Michael Stein, CEO of Valo Tx, commented, "With our latest funding from existing investors, of EUR1.1m, we’ve now raised a total of over EUR 10m, which will enable us to further validate our platform to develop antigen-coated oncolytic viruses as therapeutic vaccines. This funding gives us a strong financial basis to progress the GMP manufacture of our lead oncolytic adenovirus using PeptiCRAd into clinical trials in Q1 2021. Our first clinical trial will target melanoma, lung cancer and triple negative breast cancer. To help translate our exceptional science into effective treatments for patients with cancer, we plan to complete a Series A by summer 2020."
PeptiCRAd (Peptide-coated Conditionally Replicating Adenovirus) is an innovative way of combining the best features of two clinically proven cancer immunotherapy approaches, an oncolytic adenovirus and a peptide vaccine. PeptiCRAd uses immunogenic viruses as active carriers of tumour-specific peptides to direct the immune system to specifically target and kill cancer cells.
Valo’s EUR 10m funding comprises the recent EUR 1.1m from existing investors, a non-dilutive loan from The Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation (Business Finland, previously Tekes), and seed capital from private investors.