On June 15, 2015 Invenra, Inc., a pre-clinical stage bio-pharmaceutical company focused on next-generation therapeutic human antibodies and antibody derivatives, and Oxford BioTherapeutics (OBT), an international, clinical stage biotechnology company developing a range of innovative antibody-based therapeutics for cancer, reported a collaboration to identify and characterize a panel of fully human therapeutic monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) against a novel cancer target that OBT has identified utilizing its OGAP discovery platform (Press release, Invenra, JUN 25, 2015, View Source [SID1234570590]).
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Under the terms of the agreement, OBT will make an initial payment to Invenra upon successful delivery of a panel of novel mAbs confirmed to meet mutually agreed design goals and specifications. OBT will be responsible for all further development of the therapeutic product candidates. Assuming successful development, Invenra could receive further milestone payments and royalties on net sales of therapeutic and diagnostic products. In addition, OBT obtains diagnostic product rights from Invenra and will have the option of developing diagnostic products. Further financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Invenra’s proprietary platform is based on ultra-high throughput technology to synthesize hundreds of thousands of full-length antibodies via cell-free expression and release them into nanowells, where they can be directly and quickly interrogated against cells in a multi-plexed fashion with a diverse set of immunotypic and biologically relevant assays. The Invenra technology allows rapid identification of high affinity mAbs with the broadest epitope coverage possible while simultaneously performing direct phenotypic screening to isolate those mAbs with the most relevant biological activity, thus leading to the selection of the best lead compounds for further development.
OBT’s proprietary target discovery platform, OGAP (Oxford Genome Anatomy Project), incorporates one of the world’s largest proprietary cell-membrane focused proteomic databases, with data on over 5,000 cancer membrane proteins providing unique, highly-qualified oncology targets that are selected for optimal ADC activity.
Keith Wilson, OBT’s chief scientific officer, said, "OBT is passionate about developing targeted cancer therapies for patients, and we are excited to be working with Invenra on a new approach to pursue mAb-based therapies. This collaboration leverages the complementary expertise of our two companies in identifying optimal mAbs against targets differentially expressed in cancer."
Roland Green, CEO and president of Invenra, said, "This collaboration is a major milestone for Invenra as a company and a validation of our innovative technology. We are delighted to be collaborating with Oxford BioTherapeutics to identify best-in-class antibodies against their novel oncology target. In addition, this collaboration with OBT fits well within our business model, whereby we are making our technology available to a select group of companies while continuing to develop our own internal proprietary pipeline of therapeutic product candidates."