Innovative cancer therapy developer, Prescient Therapeutics (ASX: PTX), has recently announced a new collaboration with the world-renowned Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre (Peter Mac) to develop new cell therapy technologies, including CAR-T technologies. PTX will own resultant intellectual property (IP) from the research program being led by Peter Mac’s Professor Phil Darcy.

CAR-T is a type of cellular therapy that reprograms the immune cells of a cancer patient to recognise and destroy cancer and, recent CAR-T trial results have been setting the oncology world alight. 

PTX is the only ASX-listed company focused on CAR-T.

In the midst of a $6.5 million capital raise via an Share Purchase Plan (SPP), the past two quarters have been a blaze of activity from PTX, a Melbourne based biotechnology company that has been “up and about” during lockdown.

The announcement about the Peter Mac research collaboration is the latest in a string of announcements that has seen the company multiplying its pipeline of programmes.

Among these recent progress reports:

• PTX updated shareholders earlier this week about one of its foundational assets, PTX-100, a small molecule personalised cancer therapy, which is showing encouraging results and progress to the next dose level in an innovative basket study targeting multiple cancers. 
• Similar dose level progress was announced earlier in August for PTX-200’s trial in Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML).
• Last week the globally renowned Professor Phil Darcy, Laboratory Head of Cancer Immunotherapy at Peter Mac, joined the company’s scientific advisory board. 
• Another CAR-T pioneer Dr Allen Ebens joined the board in June. Ebens was an early recruit to Juno Therapeutics (Juno), which is recognised as a one of the first CAR-T companies, and a leader in the successful and rapid clinical advancement of CAR-T cancer therapies.

PTX making waves as only CAR-T play on ASX

PTX’s initial entry into CAR-T, a burgeoning multi-billion dollar industry, was in a Cell Therapy Enhancement collaboration with Carina Biotech and University of Adelaide that, in a similar way to Peter Mac (its second CAR-T collaboration), will seek to produce technologies that can complement existing CAR-T approaches. The aim of the collaborations is to create efficacy and efficiency enhancements that are relevant to all parties in the cell therapy field industry (namely CAR-T). The idea is that they can incorporate these into their own programs under license.

Prof Darcy said: “CAR-T therapy has shown strong therapeutic activity in certain haematological malignancies however the effects in solid cancers have been poor to date. The approach we are exploring with Prescient may reprogram the tumour microenvironment that results in significantly enhancing CAR T cell anti-tumour activity.”

Next generation CAR-T

Not satisfied with providing all CAR-T providers with enhanced therapies, PTX went one better in late May this year when it announced that it had signed an exclusive global licensing agreement with the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) for an innovative universal immune receptor technology platform. Effectively, next generation CAR-T.

The platform, called OmniCAR, seeks to overcome the limitations of current generation CAR-T, including safety and control flexibility in the cancers it can target.  This next-generation universal CAR-T platform is currently in the pre-clinical development stage, and is based on technology invented at UPenn; which is recognised globally as the “father” of CAR-T, having pioneered the therapy.  Novartis licensed a CAR-T technology from UPenn in 2012 that became the first CAR-T therapy approved and has opened a multi-billion dollar industry. 

In addition to the UPenn agreement, Prescient also obtained a global, non-exclusive licence from Oxford University to use the SpyTag/SpyCatcher molecular binding system employed by the OmniCAR platform.

COVID-19 screening with Doherty

In July, PTX announced that two of its assets had been selected and group one priority candidates by the Doherty Institute for its screen programme for COVID-19.

Strong balance sheet

The $6.5m SPP will add weight to the $7m cash currently on hand giving the company a strong balance sheet to pursue multiple exciting personalised cancer programmes with global leaders in the field of small molecule, cell therapy and CAR-T fields.

This Friday, please join Prescient Therapeutics CEO Steven Yatomi-Clarke for a live investor briefing.

Event Details: Date: Friday 21st August Time: 11am AEST Format: 20 minute presentation followed by a Q&A

To register for this session click here.

Reach Markets are the advisors assisting with the management of this offer and may receive fees depending on whether an offer is taken up by investors. Reach Markets have been engaged by PTX to help manage their investor communications.