On July 22, 2024 Aligos Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALGS, "Aligos"), a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing novel therapeutics to address unmet medical needs in liver and viral diseases, reported that it has entered into a clinical trial collaboration agreement with Xiamen Amoytop Biotech Co., Ltd. ("Amoytop") (Press release, Aligos Therapeutics, JUL 22, 2024, View Source [SID1234644997]).
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Under the terms of the agreement, Amoytop will sponsor and perform a Phase 1b exploratory clinical study evaluating the efficacy and safety of ALG-000184 in combination with PEGBING (Mipeginterferon alfa-2b) in chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients in China. The clinical study is expected to begin after approval by the National Medical Products Administration in China.
"We are pleased to build on our existing relationship with Amoytop, as they have proven to be a valuable partner," stated Lawrence Blatt, Ph.D., MBA, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer at Aligos Therapeutics. "We look forward to initiating this exploratory study to evaluate the combination of ALG-000184 with PEGBING, one of the approved drugs for CHB patients in China, to assess the potential benefits of a combinatory approach."
ALG-000184 is a potent best/first-in-class oral small molecule capsid assembly modulator (CAM-E) being developed for CHB. It is designed to exploit the dual role of CAMs by disrupting hepatitis B cccDNA levels and its derived transcripts by reducing expression of viral markers such as DNA, RNA, and the relevant antigens (HBsAg, HBeAg, HBcrAg). Phase 1a studies have demonstrated after single and multiple daily doses that ALG-000184 was well-tolerated, with no safety signals observed, and demonstrated linear pharmacokinetics (PK) and excellent antiviral activity. In longer term Phase 1b studies of ALG-000184 300mg x ≤96 weeks ± entecavir (ETV), ALG-000184 monotherapy has demonstrated best-in-class reductions in HBV DNA, RNA, HBsAg, HBeAg, and HBcrAg without viral breakthrough to date.
PEGBING, independently developed by Amoytop, is the world’s first 40kD pegylated interferon α-2b injection. With dual effects of inhibiting viral replication and enhancing immunity, PEGBING is mainly used in the clinical treatment of viral hepatitis and is the first-line drug for the antiviral treatment of chronic hepatitis B, which plays an important role in improving the clinical cure rate of hepatitis B and reducing the risk of liver cancer.
"We are pleased to deepen our cooperation in the field of liver disease treatment and look forward to working together to provide a new treatment solution for patients in need," said Sun Li, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at Amoytop. "Amoytop is committed to further optimizing the chronic hepatitis B combination treatment pathway and hopes that the cooperation will lead to better clinical value drugs and drug combinations."
The Phase 1b study will be a randomized, double blinded, active controlled study to evaluate the safety, pharmacokinetics, and antiviral activity of oral once daily doses of 300 mg ALG-000184 + PEGBING + entecavir (ETV) compared with 300 mg ALG-000184 + ETV or PEGBING + ETV in treatment naïve or currently-not-treated HBeAg-positive and nucleos(t)ide analog (NA) suppressed HBeAg-negative subjects with CHB for 48 weeks.