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Agreement accelerates development of Adaptimmune's lead T-cell therapy targeting NY-ESO-1 toward pivotal trials
- Creates opportunity for up to eight combination studies
LONDON, PHILADELPHIA and OXFORD, United Kingdom,
Adaptimmune and GSK announced a strategic collaboration and licensing agreement in
"We are delighted to broaden our collaboration with GSK, which is also fully committed to the development of this revolutionary T-cell therapy," commented James Noble, Adaptimmune's Chief Executive Officer. "We believe that our affinity enhanced T-cell programs have the potential to deliver important clinical benefit to cancer patients, and it is therefore essential that we accelerate our efforts to meet their needs. We are working closely with GSK to expedite development of our affinity enhanced T-cell therapy targeting NY-ESO, and if we succeed in generating pivotal data consistent with that of our ongoing studies, we believe it has the potential to be the first engineered T-cell therapy to reach the market."
Dr. Axel Hoos, SVP Oncology R&D GSK said, "At GSK we're progressing a pipeline of immuno-oncology therapies to stimulate anti-tumor immunity in patients. As we highlighted to investors at our R&D event last year, this Adaptimmune collaboration is a key element of that pipeline and is part of a comprehensive program for cell and gene therapy. With this expanded collaboration, we have the opportunity to accelerate the lead program in synovial sarcoma toward pivotal trials and also to investigate several other tumor types and combine the T-cell therapy with immune-modulating therapies such as checkpoint inhibitors."
Under the terms of the expanded agreement, the companies will accelerate the development of Adaptimmune's NY-ESO therapy into pivotal studies in synovial sarcoma and will explore development in myxoid round cell liposarcoma. Additionally, the companies may initiate up to eight proof-of-principle studies exploring combinations with other therapies, including checkpoint inhibitors.
According to the expanded development plan, the studies will be conducted by Adaptimmune with GSK effectively funding the pivotal studies and sharing the costs of the combination studies via a success based milestone structure.
Previous guidance relating to the collaboration disclosed potential cash payments to Adaptimmune of approximately
Adaptimmune has also reiterated its prior cash burn guidance, which remains unchanged as the majority of the expansion and acceleration costs will be funded by GSK. For the full year 2016, the company expects its cash burn to be between
About affinity enhanced T-cell candidates
Adaptimmune's affinity enhanced T-cell candidates are novel cancer immunotherapies that have been engineered to target and destroy cancer cells by strengthening a patient's natural T-cell response. Using its proprietary technology, Adaptimmune has created a pipeline of affinity enhanced T-cell therapies targeting certain antigens, including cancer testis antigens such as NY-ESO. NY-ESO-1 is one of the best-characterized and most immunogenic cancer testis antigens, and is frequently expressed by tumors of different origins and in advanced tumors. The company's trials in the NY-ESO-1 program in multiple myeloma, melanoma, sarcoma and ovarian cancer continue to generate encouraging results.
About Adaptimmune
Adaptimmune is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on novel cancer immunotherapy products based on its T-cell receptor (TCR) platform. Established in 2008, the company aims to utilize the body's own machinery - the T-cell - to target and destroy cancer cells by using engineered, increased affinity TCRs as a means of strengthening natural patient T-cell responses. Adaptimmune's lead program is an affinity enhanced T-cell therapy targeting the NY-ESO cancer antigen. Its NY-ESO TCR affinity enhanced T-cell therapy has demonstrated signs of efficacy and tolerability in Phase 1/2 trials in solid tumors and in hematologic cancer types, including synovial sarcoma and multiple myeloma. In addition, Adaptimmune has a number of proprietary programs. The company has identified over 30 intracellular target peptides preferentially expressed in cancer cells and is currently progressing 12 through unpartnered research programs. Adaptimmune has over 200 employees and is located in
GSK – one of the world's leading research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies – is committed to improving the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer. For further information please visit www.gsk.com.
Cautionary statement regarding forward-looking statements
GSK cautions investors that any forward-looking statements or projections made by GSK, including those made in this announcement, are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Such factors include, but are not limited to, those described under Item 3.D 'Risk factors' in the company's Annual Report on Form 20-F for 2014.
Forward-Looking Statements
This release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PSLRA). These forward-looking statements involve certain risks and uncertainties. Such risks and uncertainties could cause our actual results to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements, and include, without limitation: the success, cost and timing of our product development activities and clinical trials and our ability to successfully advance our TCR therapeutic candidates through the regulatory and commercialization processes. For a further description of the risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed in these forward-looking statements, as well as risks relating to our business in general, we refer you to our Annual Report on Form 20-F filed with the
Adaptimmune Contacts Will Roberts Vice President, Investor Relations T: (215) 825-9306 E: [email protected] Margaret Henry Head of PR T: +44 (0)1235 430036 Mob: +44 (0)7710 304249 E: [email protected]