Imugene & Arovella collaborate for a preclinical trial to explore treatment options for solid cancers

Highlights

• Imugene Limited and Arovella Therapeutics have inked a research agreement for a strategic collaboration.
• The two biotech firms will conduct a preclinical trial of ALA’s iNKT cell therapy (CAR19-iNKT) and IMU’s onCARlytics (CF33-CD19) platform to target solid tumours.
• The study will be exploring the potential of using the iNKT cell therapy in cancers, addressing a major unmet need.

Even as the world is witnessing a revolution in medical technology, cancer continues to be a major health issue. Around 19.3 million new cancer cases (18.1 million excluding non-melanoma skin cancer) occurred in the year 2020 across the world. Also, cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide, accounting for nearly 10 million deaths in 2020, as per WHO.

Two biotech companies, Imugene Limited (ASX:IMU) and Arovella Therapeutics (ASX:ALA), have joined hands to contribute to the ongoing cell therapy revolution in cancer treatment. The two firms have entered a strategic collaboration to work on a combination of an off-the-shelf cell therapy and oncolytic virus to detect and eliminate solid tumours.

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As per the company announcement, the collaboration holds the potential to bring in long- and short-term business benefits to both firms as it will strengthen their foothold in the global cancer therapeutics market, which, according to Precedence Research, is likely to touch AU$366 billion by 2030. The market is growing at a compound annual growth rate of 9.1%.

Imugene bringing effective new treatments and options to cancer patients

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Understanding the two elements of the unique duo

Imugene’s CF33 is an oncolytic virus developed by Professor Yuman Fong at City of Hope to target tumour cells. The virus has been engineered by Dr Saul Priceman to induce CD19 production after identifying the tumour cells. The company initiated its phase 1 trials with CHECKvacc last year in October and with VAXINIA in May 2022.

Arovella’s CAR19-iNKT cells are being developed by Professor Tassos Karadimitris at Imperial College London as an off-the-shelf product for cancer treatment. These cells are highly potent and get activated rapidly to destroy CD19-expressing cancer cells.

Image Source: Company Announcement

The combination of the two, CF33-CD19 and CAR19-iNKT cells, gives new hope to solid tumour treatment. Here’s a brief about the mechanism of action!

Arovella's lead invariant natural killer T (iNKT) product, ALA-101, consists of a chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) that targets tumour cells producing CD19 on their surface, while Imugene's onCARlytics platform allows solid tumour cancers to express CD19 on their surface. Thus, the onCARlytics platform provides the opportunity to utilise ALA-101 to destroy solid tumour cells. Currently, ALA-101 is under development for CD19-producing blood cancers.

Image Source: Company Announcement

Image Source: Company Announcement

An insight into Arovella Therapeutics

The ASX-listed biotech firm Arovella Therapeutics operates in the challenging arena of life-changing drugs and therapeutics for human diseases. Its prime focus is oncology and conditions that affect the central nervous system. The company is developing its iNKT cell platform for cancer treatment.

Arovella is also involved in developing low-risk oral sprays to reformulate existing pharmaceuticals. Administering drugs through the oral mucosa (e.g., via the cheeks, tongue, gums, and palate) has potential benefits such as lower dosages, reduced side effects, ease of use, and faster response times. The primary product pipeline of the firm includes an oral spray for the platelet-lowering drug anagrelide for treating metastatic disease in the background of high platelets and ZolpiMist™, a first-in-class oral spray of zolpidem tartrate for short-term insomnia.

Details of agreement

Effective 26 September 2022, Imugene and Arovella signed a research collaboration agreement for the initial term of a year. As per the terms of the strategic collaboration, Arovella will fund the preclinical studies from its planned research budget.

At present, both firms have full intellectual property (IP) rights (patents) over their respective background technology. In case a fresh IP is generated from the research collaboration, the filing, prosecution, maintenance, enforcement, and defence of any patent applications thereto, as well as each party’s right to use such a combination invention, will be decided by both parties involved.

Imugene and Arovella will decide mutually on the processes of development and commercialisation as needed after obtaining the results of the research collaboration on commercially reasonable terms.

IMU shares were trading at AU$0.180 on 27 September 2022.