Imugene Ltd (ASX:IMU) (OTCMKTS:IUGNF) and City of Hope®, a world-renowned independent cancer research and treatment centre near Los Angeles, have entered into a licensing agreement for the patents covering a novel combination immunotherapy.
The therapy unleashes a CD19 expressing oncolytic virus to enable CD19 directed chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapies to target solid tumours, which are currently otherwise difficult to treat with CAR T cell therapy alone.
The worldwide exclusive licence of the patents covering the cell therapy technology, which includes CF33-CD19, known as onCARlytics™, or an agent that tags cancer cells for CAR T cell destruction, was developed at City of Hope.
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“Opens up new market”
This new research may expand the use of CD19 CAR T therapy with onCARlytics™ to the treatment of patients with potentially any solid tumour.
Imugene managing director and CEO Leslie Chong said: “This platform opens up the entire field of use to cellular therapy for the CF33 OV.
“Supercharging CF33 with CD19 is a revolutionary new paradigm in combination therapy with any CD19 binding therapies to include bi-specifics, antibody drug conjugates and CAR T, cell therapy for solid tumours.
“The CAR T cell field currently only treats ~10% of all cancers such as blood or liquid tumours, whereas this technology has the potential to open up the solid tumour market.”
CD19 CAR T cell therapy is approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to treat certain types of blood cancers, namely B cell lymphomas and acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
“Effectively targeting solid tumours”
City of Hope scientists have combined two potent immunotherapies - Imugene’s CD19 oncolytic virus and CD19 CAR T cell therapy - with the goal of targeting and eradicating solid tumours that are otherwise difficult to treat with CAR T cell therapy alone.
City of Hope Department of Hematology and Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation assistant professor Saul Priceman said: “Our research demonstrates that oncolytic viruses are a powerful and promising approach that can be combined strategically with CAR T cell therapy to effectively target solid tumours in patients.
“This therapeutic platform addresses two major challenges that make solid tumours so difficult to treat with immunotherapy.
“There are limited solid tumour targets that T cells can be redirected against with CARs.
“Solid tumours are surrounded by a brick wall - a so-called immunosuppressive tumour microenvironment.
“When a CAR T cell attempts to enter the tumour, survive, and kill cancer cells, it can’t effectively because of this barrier.”
City of Hope scientists have genetically engineered an oncolytic virus to enter tumour cells and force the expression of CD19 on the cell surface and were then able to use CD19 directed CAR T cells to recognize and attack these solid tumours.
City of Hope surgical oncology sangiacomo family chair professor Yuman Fong M.D. said: “Our City of Hope team designed this CF33 oncolytic virus to do what it does so well.
“It enters the cancer cell, uses the cell’s own machinery to replicate itself, and engineer the cancer cells to express the well-known CAR T cell target, CD19.”
Sponsored research agreement
A separate four-year sponsored research agreement with City of Hope and the research team led by
Dr. Priceman to further develop the technology has also been executed.
Under the terms of the licence agreement, Imugene acquires the exclusive worldwide rights to develop and commercialize the patents covering the CF33-CD19 for which it has agreed to pay City of Hope license fees comprising an upfront, annual maintenance fees which are creditable against future royalty payments, performance-based consideration linked to the achievement of certain value inflexion development milestones and commercial outcomes, as well as net sales based on single-digit royalty payments, and sublicensing fees.
All upfront cash payments under the licence agreement will be funded through Imugene’s existing cash reserves.