PureTech Health has moved into new digs in Boston's Seaport district. As a step toward growing the company and ramping up its pipeline, the new headquarters will bring PureTech’s labs under one roof as it builds its in-house programs, though several of its affiliate companies will stay at a different site in Boston.
PureTech’s affiliates cover a range of therapeutic areas and include central nervous system (CNS) players Karuna Pharmaceuticals and Sonde Health; resTORbio, which is working on aging-related diseases; and Akili Interactive, which has submitted a digital medicine for ADHD for FDA approval.
The company’s in-house pipeline focuses on adjusting how the immune system works in specific tissues. Its approach is two-pronged: Its programs target mechanisms in cancer that suppress the immune system and exploit the lymphatic system—which plays a key role in programming and directing immune cells to specific tissues—to treat CNS and lymphatic disorders, autoimmune diseases and cancers.
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Its lead programs are both monoclonal antibodies aimed at immunosuppression in solid tumors. The more advanced one, LYT-200, targets Galectin-9, and the second, LYT-210, targets gamma delta T cells. It expects to move LYT-200 into the clinic in 2020.
“Tissue-selective, rather than systemic, immunomodulation is a powerful new avenue for more tailored medicines, and cutting-edge research is validating the lymphatic system as an important highway for immune activity across countless conditions,” said PureTech Chief Scientific Officer Joe Bolen, Ph.D., in a statement.
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“At PureTech, we are proud to have built a world-class team of researchers, collaborators, and advisers around these areas to advance our scientific vision. The consolidation and colocation of our formerly Cambridge- and Boston-based labs into this new state-of-the-art facility will support the continued expansion and rapid advancement of this vision as we build out our internal pipeline,” Bolen said.
Though PureTech is bringing its in-house operations under one roof, it will keep its site in the Back Bay neighborhood—which lies between Cambridge and its new HQ in Seaport—running to house its affiliates.
Editor's note: This story was updated to correct the previous location of PureTech's offices. They were at the company's Back Bay site in Boston, not in Cambridge, where some of its affiliate companies operate.