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Avacta Group PLC technology at an "inflexion point" following "excellent" results from latest study

Published: 02:42 03 Apr 2017 EDT

picture of an affimer molecule
Affimer molecules are ten times smaller than antibodies

Avacta Group Plc described as “excellent” results from the latest study of its Affimer technology, which it said is now at an “inflection point” as a therapeutic platform.

Researchers looked at immunogenicity - assessing whether Affimer provoked an unwanted immune response – and compared with Avastin, an antibody used to treat cancer.

It was shown to have low immunogenicity, which chief executive Dr Alastair Smith, said “significantly de-risks” the Avacta breakthrough and potentially opens up a “multi-billion dollar biotherapeutics market”.

“Immunogenicity is a key concern for any protein-based therapeutic in development, especially for a new therapeutic platform such as that based on our Affimer technology,” he went on.

“I am delighted that the results of this extensive study shows unequivocally that none of the Affimer scaffolds induce a significant immunogenic response.

“This bodes well for their further development as therapeutics, as there is an accepted correlation between this type of ex-vivo study and a patient's immunogenic response when dosed with the drug in the clinic.”

Affimer has been designed to address many of the negative performance issues of antibodies, including time taken to generate them, their poor specificity (ability to target the correct disease) and the variability of batches.

The update was provided alongside the company’s interim results for the six months ended January 31.

Operationally, Avacta revealed “excellent progress” had been made with the company’s in-house immuno-oncology programme, which is on course to have its first drug candidate in the clinic by 2019.

Avacta said multiple Affimer leads had been found, while the first animal efficacy study was completed during the period with positive results.

The customer order book for Affimer, meanwhile, is up 70% year-on-year, with four out of the top ten global pharma giants and more than ten other biotech and pharma companies paying to use the Avacta technology, or collaborating with the firm.

Revenues for the half-year increased 20% to £1.3mln, while the operating loss was £3.9mln.

More importantly, the company is financially well positioned with cash of £16.1mln in the bank as at January 31.

 

 

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