Hi all,
Thought I'd put together a quick brief of what's happened over the last few months at Imugene. I mainly put this together for myself to keep up with the newsflow (basically a re-cap of recent announcements) but thought I'd share here. Sharing is caring as they say.
- Currently included in the ASX300, and likely soon to be included in the ASX200 in December 2021.
- World class Leadership Team and Scientific Advisory Boards. To name a few:
oLeslie Chong – CEO, 20 years Phase 1-3 oncology experience, ex-Genentech.
oPaul Hopper – Executive Chairman, biotech investor extraordinaire, a well-connected guy in the biotech space.
oAxel Hoos – ex Head of Oncology at Glaxxo-Smith-Kline, ex-Medical Lead at Bristol-Myers Squibb.
oUrsula Wiedermann – HER-Vaxx developer, based in Medical University of Vienna.
oPravin Kaumaya – An expert in vaccine research, esp. peptide vaccines for cancer.
oYuman Fong – creator of CF33 oncolytic virus, absolute legend. Recently inducted into the National Academy of Medicine, one of the highest honours in health and medicine.
- 18 May 2021 - Imugene entered licensing agreement with City of Hope for CD19 oncolytic virus. Named “OnCARlytics”, the virus ‘tags’ solid tumors by forcing them to express CD19 on the cell surface. This allows CAR T therapies to more easily identify tumours that would otherwise remain hidden from the immune system. When CAR T therapies identify CD19 expressed tumours, they blow them up. Very cool.
- 29 July 2021 - $90mill placement announced. Whether the placement was instigated by IMU or instos not too sure. Additional $5mill raised by existing shareholders. Funds to be used for clinical trials for HER-Vaxx, PD-1-Vaxx, CHECKvacc, Vaxinia and OnCARlytics. There are some rumours swirling that Horizons Ventures may be one of the investors (think Facebook, Siri, Zoom, Spotify to name a few of their previous/current investments).
- 5 August 2021 - Imugene and Celularity announce they will engage in an exclusive strategic partnership to develop an OnCARlytic + allogeneic CAR T treatment. Allogeneic treatment means can be produced “off the shelf”, and does not require a patient’s own DNA to produce the therapy. From this perspective, such a treatment could be produced en masse and be more readily available.
- 22 September 2021 – HER-Vaxx patent granted in Japan. HER-Vaxx targets gastric cancers, and Asian populations have a high incidence of gastric cancers relative to other populations.
- 20 October 2021 – First patient dosed with CHECKvacc (CF33 oncolytic virus). Yuman’s baby, 20+ years in the making, finally makes it into the arm of the first patient. The moment I have been waiting for since first investing in IMU in 2019. Had a few drinks that night to celebrate.
- 1 November 2021 – Imugene and Eureka Therapeutics engage in strategic collaboration for OnCARlytic + CAR T therapy. As I understand it, Eureka’s ARTEMIS CAR-T is an autologous therapy (requires patient’s own stem cells to initiate the treatment).
Hopefully @whatmighthavben will post one of his weekly chapters of the IMU story, I've been enjoying reading them a lot. Have a good weekend everyone.
(20min delay)