Alphageneron Pharmaceuticals has signed an Exclusive License Agreement with Multimmune GmbH, of Munich, Germany, for its clinical stage autologous Natural Killer (NK) cell therapy and companion diagnostic platform, for all fields worldwide.
The autologous NK cell therapy redirects a patient’s NK cells to target a cell membrane form of Heat Shock Protein 70 (Hsp70) which has been discovered to be highly expressed on many cancer cells, but not on healthy cells. NK cells are harvested from the patient’s blood, activated ex vivo with a synthetic Hsp70 peptide and IL-2 and administered back to the patient.
A Phase I clinical trial in twelve (12) patients with metastatic colorectal cancer and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) completed in Germany showed the autologous NK cell therapy was safe, and had promising signs of efficacy. A Phase IIa (randomized, controlled) clinical trial with fourteen (14) patients with Stage IIIb inoperable NSCLC after radio-chemotherapy completed in Germany has reported five (5) of 7 patients (71%) treated with the NK cell therapy to show promising signs of clinical benefit, including a complete response, and a partial response. Only 2 of 7 patients (28%) in the Control group showed positive clinical responses to radio-chemotherapy alone. A Companion Diagnostic using proprietary monoclonal antibodies was used to select patients with tumors expressing membrane Hsp70.
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“We are delighted to have entered this license agreement with Alphageneron, which will advance our NK cell therapy into more extensive clinical trials, and commercialization,” said Graham Pockley, PhD, Chief Executive Officer of Multimmune. “The potential for this NK cell therapy to treat a large range of aggressive cancers is a revolutionary breakthrough,” said Robert K. Brooks, JD, Chief Executive Officer of Alphageneron Pharmaceuticals.
Under the terms of the Exclusive License Agreement, Alphageneron is obligated to pay Multimmune a confidential amount in developmental and regulatory milestones, plus post-commercialization royalties. On July 6, 2020, Alphageneron entered into an Exclusive Option to Purchase agreement with Multimmune. On July 7, 2020, Alphageneron and Multimmune signed a Collaboration Agreement to repurpose its NK cell therapy platform for treating SARS-COV-2 (COVID-19).