Imugene Ltd (ASX:IMU) (OTCMKTS:IUGNF) has boosted its finances by A$2.524 million following the exercise of options by the company's managing director and executive chairman.
Executive chairman Paul Hopper has exercised 25 million options at a value of A$1.07 million and managing director and CEO Leslie Chong exercised 36.2 million options.
The value of Chong's exercising of options was A$1.517 million with a remaining 13.8 million options to be exercised in the near future.
Imugene will use the additional funds to further its research and development activities.
Licensing agreement with City of Hope®
Imugene recently entered into a licensing agreement with City of Hope® for the patents covering a novel combination immunotherapy.
This 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.