It's an extremely interesting question - and the first thing that jumped out at me. The Estrella/SPAC merger/listing does seem to be entirely focussed around the Artemis and the Artemis/OnCARlytics combination therapy.
They have a two stage plan. Their first goal is to get Artemis in the market against blood borne cancers, because it seems to be as effective as traditional CAR-T but without the severe Cytokine Release Syndrome side effects.
Step 2 is to get Artemis approved for use in solid tumours, via the Artemis/OnCARlytics combination therapy.
Basically, Dr Cheng Liu has waited until he had the preclinical results for the Artemis/OnCARlytics combo and then immediately moved to spin that project off from (non-public) Eureka Therapeutics into Estrella, which is publicly listing on the Nasdaq via a merger with a SPAC.
Dr Liu remains as the head of Eureka, but he is also the CEO at Estrella.
My reading of this:
Dr Liu is convinced that the Artemis/OnCARlytics combination will work in humans.
He wants to get Artemis to market as fast as possible - both as a stand alone in blood borne cancers and in the Artemis/OnCARlytics combo for solid tumours
Listing on the Nasdaq will bring cash to achieve the plan
The implications for Imugene:
Way back when the original partnership with Eureka was signed, the agreement was that both parties would cover their own costs for the preclinical work, and then any future development would be negotiated in good faith on commercial terms. The exact wording is in the supplementary Ann of 9/11/21:
"Each party has full intellectual property (IP) rights (patents) to their individual background technology. In the event new IP is generated from the strategic collaboration (each a “Joint Collaboration Technology”), the parties shall discuss in good faith the filing, prosecution, maintenance, enforcement, defense of any patent applications relating thereto, as well as each party’s right to use, such Joint Collaboration Technology"
After the results from this research agreement are known and can be quantified, the parties will negotiate in good faith (and without obligation) whether to jointly develop or commercialise on the outcomes of the strategic collaboration on commercially reasonable terms.
When you look at the Poster Presentation, as a final statement it declares unequivocally that the Artemis/OnCARlytics combo "will be tested in multiple in vivo models." (Emphasis added)
On the Estrella website is also states unequivocally that "we are also developing multiple pipeline candidates using the “mark-and-kill” approach to address various types of solid tumors, as well as specificity challenges previously thought impossible to overcome." Source: https://www.estrellabio.com/pipeline
Also on their website they make it plain that the "Mark and Kill" is a reference to OnCARlytics: "To address the issue of the lack of solid tumor-specific targets, we use an oncolytic virus to force solid tumor cells to express the CD19 protein on the cell surface. The CD19-Redirected ARTEMIS T Cells can then pursue and kill the CD19-labeled solid tumors, offering a potential treatment solution to cancers where there are no inherently abundant solid tumor-specific targets available." Source: https://www.estrellabio.com/technology. The "Read more about Mark and Kill approach" hyperlink on the same page takes you to the original scientific publication by Drs Fong and Priceman and others, describing the development of what we now call OnCARlytics.
So Estrella is declaring very plainly that they intend to develop the Artemis/OnCARlytics combo therapy as fast as they can.
If that is the case, then Imugene and Estrella must be very close to announcing the terms for that next stage of collaboration. ie "After the results from this research agreement are known and can be quantified, the parties will negotiate in good faith (and without obligation) whether to jointly develop or commercialise on the outcomes of the strategic collaboration on commercially reasonable terms."
They would have a few options. The Nasdaq listing may raise all the cash needed for further development, with an agreement on the terms of a future commercialisation. I don't think Estrella could raise the cash needed to offer IMU a sensible commercial licensing deal for the use of OnCARlytics, because (if it really does succeed in humans) the value is vast, and IMU would be crazy to accept an early low ball offer before a trial in human subjects is done. However they might Announce a future profit sharing deal.
IMU might negotiate a shareholding in Estrella as part of an interim agreement, or use some of their large cash reserve to buy a share in the IPO.
Either way, Estrella is saying that OnCARlytics is central to their product pipeline, and they are about to list on the Nasdaq. When that happens, the share price of Estrella on the Nasdaq will, in effect, be a proxy for the partial valuation of Imugene. ( ie. the value of OnCARlytics as a combo with Artemis).
That is why, in my earlier post, I said that the Estrella listing with be interesting to watch. People have been banging on for years about IMU listing on the Nasdaq, and how undervalued we are compared to USA peers. This will give us a partial test of that theory. Fascinating!
I will also be watching, with huge interest, to see if IMU announces the term for future collaboration with Estrella (and indeed also with Celularity).
Those little bubble you see on the bottom of a pan of water on the stove? They are the sign that things are getting much hotter.
In Biotech terms, OnCARlytics could start boiling very soon....
Cheers
Dave
IMU Price at posting:
19.8¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
