AskBio Licenses Rights to Selecta Biosciences’ ImmTOR Immune Tolerance Platform for the Treatment of Pompe Disease | More News | News Channels -…

Details Category: More News Published on Friday, 20 December 2019 13:54 Hits: 143

Selecta eligible to receive upfront and milestone payments of over $240 million

AskBios AAV gene therapy combined with ImmTOR could prevent the formation of neutralizing antibodies and potentially enable re-treatment of patients with Pompe disease

WATERTOWN, MA and RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC, USA I December 19, 2019 ISelecta Biosciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: SELB) and Asklepios BioPharmaceutical, Inc. (AskBio), today announced that the companies have entered into a license agreement. Under the terms of the agreement, AskBio has exercised its option to exclusively license rights to develop and commercialize Selectas immune tolerance platform, ImmTOR, for use in adeno-associated virus (AAV) gene therapy for the treatment of Pompe disease. When used in combination with AAV gene therapy vectors, Selectas ImmTOR has been shown to inhibit the immune response to the vector (Nature Communications, October 2018).

Selecta and AskBio previously announced a strategic partnership in August 2019 to jointly develop, manufacture, and commercialize targeted therapeutics for next-generation AAV gene therapies in areas of high medical need. Under the terms of this new license agreement, Selecta is eligible to receive upfront and milestone payments of over $240 million plus royalties on product sales.

We are pleased to advance our ImmTOR platform in a new partnership with AskBio for Pompe disease, a serious and progressively debilitating disease, said Carsten Brunn, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of Selecta. We are excited to collaborate with AskBio to potentially enable the retreatment of AAV gene therapies.

There is a demonstrated unmet medical need for better treatment approaches for Pompe disease, and this collaboration will enable us to effectively advance our Pompe program with the added benefit of Selectas ImmTOR technology, said Sheila Mikhail, CEO and co-founder of AskBio. The opportunity to re-treat patients holds significant promise, and we are pleased to be able to leverage our relationship with Selecta and apply the ImmTOR technology to potentially overcome the challenges associated with re-administering systemic AAV gene therapies.

Pompe disease is a rare, progressive, debilitating condition that affects 5,000 to 10,000 people worldwide. It impacts ventilator, cardiac and skeletal muscles and can cause motor neuron dysfunction, with effects on cognition, hearing, speech and fine motor skills. Pompe disease can manifest any time between infancy and late adulthood and may have differing symptoms and severity, depending on when it develops. There is a substantial unmet medical need for more efficient and effective treatments for Pompe disease. Currently, the only approved treatment is ERT with recombinant human GAA (rhGAA), a chronically administered therapy requiring increasing doses, which can elevate both costs and treatment burden.

AboutSelecta Biosciences, Inc. Selecta Biosciences, Inc.is a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on unlocking the full potential of biologic therapies based on its immune tolerance technology (ImmTOR) platform.Selectaplans to combine ImmTOR with a range of biologic therapies for rare and serious diseases that require new treatment options due to high immunogenicity. The companys current proprietary pipeline includes ImmTOR-powered therapeutic enzyme and gene therapy product candidates. SEL-212, the companys lead product candidate, is being developed to treat chronic refractory gout patients and resolve their debilitating symptoms, including flares and gouty arthritis. Selectas proprietary gene therapy product candidates are in preclinical development for certain rare inborn errors of metabolism and incorporate ImmTOR with the goal of addressing barriers to repeat administration.Selectais based inWatertown, Massachusetts. For more information, please visithttp://selectabio.com.

About AskBio Founded in 2001, Asklepios BioPharmaceutical, Inc. (AskBio) is a privately held, clinical-stage gene therapy platform company dedicated to improving the lives of children and adults with genetic disorders. AskBios gene therapy platform includes an industry-leading proprietary cell line manufacturing process known as Pro10 and an extensive AAV capsid library. Based in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, the company has generated hundreds of proprietary third-generation gene vectors, several of which have entered clinical testing. An early innovator in the space, the company holds more than 500 patents in areas such as AAV production, chimeric vectors and self-complementary DNA. AskBio maintains a portfolio of clinical programs across a range of neurodegenerative and neuromuscular indications with a current clinical pipeline that includes therapeutics for Pompe disease, limb-girdle muscular dystrophy and congestive heart failure, as well as out-licensed clinical indications for hemophilia (Chatham Therapeutics acquired by Takeda) and Duchenne muscular dystrophy (Bamboo Therapeutics acquired by Pfizer). For more information, visit https://www.askbio.com/.

About Pompe Disease Pompe disease is an inherited lysosomal storage disorder caused by deficiency of the enzyme acid alpha-glucosidase (GAA). Reduced or absent levels of GAA lead to accumulation of glycogen in cells, which is believed to result in the clinical manifestations of Pompe disease. The disease can be debilitating and is characterized by severe muscle weakness that worsens over time. Pompe disease ranges from a rapidly fatal infantile form with significant impacts to heart function, to a more slowly progressive, late-onset form primarily affecting skeletal muscle. It is estimated that Pompe disease affects approximately 5,000 to 10,000 people worldwide.

SOURCE: AskBio

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AskBio Licenses Rights to Selecta Biosciences' ImmTOR Immune Tolerance Platform for the Treatment of Pompe Disease | More News | News Channels -...