Download Posters – Immunology and Oncology NAME OF THE PROJECT Bio

Posters –
Immunology and Oncology
NAME OF THE PROJECT
NAME OF THE MAIN CONTACT
ORGANISATION NAME
Bio-specific and Bio-stable Reagent for Thiols Ligation
Jérémie Fournier
SATT Conectus Alsace
Technology
APN technology allows modification of native biomolecules through reaction with
cysteine residues of proteins and antibodies. Conjugates formed by this technology were
shown to be more stable in plasma and inside cells comparing to maleimide conjugates
that are currently used in the majority of Antibody-Drug Conjugates (ADC) therapies. This
stability is of crucial importance for biomedical applications as it can substantially
increase therapeutic index of new ADCs.
Customers / Target market
The market of Antibody-Drug Conjugates is in its dawn with only 2 recently approved
drugs: Kadcyla and Adcetris. The worldwide sales of ADCs are estimated to reach $2.8B by
2018. The clinical pipeline is growing at an increasing rate and currently includes more
than 40 drug candidates. Technology providers play crucial role in this market as
illustrated by the substantial increase in upfront (from $3M to $20M average) and
milestone (from $38M to $240M average) payments received by these companies since
2005.
Today’s market of conjugation technologies for the preparation of ADC is mainly
represented by two technology providers: ImmunoGen and Seattle Genetics. Their
conjugation technologies are used in 90% of ADCs in the clinical development.
Industry and competitors
Financing need / Commercial
opportunity
IP – Patent situation
The technologies of both leading technology providers are based on the maleimide-thiol
conjugation chemistry. However, the resulting conjugates were recently shown to have
limited in vivo stability, which leads to premature release of the toxic payload. This
increases the off-target toxicity of the ADCs and causes a variety of severe side effects.
Conectus Alsace will transfer an exclusive licence to the start-up company Syndivia. This
company seeks 1.5M Eur in equity financing in order to carry on with the preclinical
development of its lead candidate and to develop the pipeline of partnered drug
candidates.
An European patent application was filed on 4th of July 2013 and a PCT international
application was filed on 4th of July 2014. This application was published under the
reference WO2015001117.
The start-up company (Syndivia) will be granted an exclusive worldwide license for the
APN technology
Future steps / Milestones
The technology will be licensed to the start-up company (Syndivia) which seeks for
partnerships and co-development opportunities with:
1. Biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies interested in entering the ADC
market.
2. Companies developing therapeutic monoclonal antibodies.
3. Companies developing cytotoxic compounds.
1) www.syndivia.com
Further reading
2) Koniev, O., et al. (2014) Selective irreversible chemical tagging of cysteine with 3arylpropiolonitriles. Bioconjug. Chem. 25, 202–206.
3) Kolodych, S., et al. (2015) CBTF: New Amine-to-Thiol Coupling Reagent for Preparation
of Antibody Conjugates with Increased Plasma Stability. Bioconjug. Chem. 26, 197–200.
4) Koniev, O., et al. (2015) MAPN: First-in-Class Reagent for Kinetically Resolved Thiol-toThiol Conjugation. Bioconjug. Chem. 26, 1863–1867.
Contact person
Jérémie
Fournier,
PhD,
Project
[email protected]
1/2
leader,
SATT
Conectus
Alsace