Cambridge Joins Consortium to Launch £40 Million Apollo Therapeutics Fund Three global pharmaceutical companies and the technology transfer offices of three universities – Imperial College London, University College London and the University of Cambridge – have joined forces with a combined £40 million to create the Apollo Therapeutics Fund. This joint venture will support the translation of ground-breaking academic science from within these universities into innovative new medicines for a broad range of diseases. [University of Cambridge] Press Release CEVEC and Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope Enter into a Cooperation and License Agreement on CEVEC’s Proprietary CAP®GT Technology CEVEC Pharmaceuticals GmbH announced a collaboration agreement with Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope on CEVEC’s proprietary CAP®GT technology. [CEVEC Pharmaceuticals GmbH] Press Release MD Anderson, AbbVie Connect to Advance Cancer Immunotherapy The immunotherapy platform at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and AbbVie will join forces to find new ways to unleash the immune system’s potential to fight cancer. The three-year collaboration agreement provides a framework for MD Anderson and AbbVie to efficiently choose and carry out preclinical and clinical studies evaluating new ideas in the cutting-edge area of immuno-oncology. [AbbVie Inc.] Press Release Cellectis Enters into New Agreement with CELLforCURE for the cGMP Manufacturing of UCART123 for Hematological Malignancies Cellectis announced that it entered into a new agreement for the cGMP manufacturing of UCART123 clinical batches, Cellectis’ lead product candidate, with CELLforCURE, an LFB group company and the largest industrial facility for clinical and commercial production of innovative cell therapies in Europe. [Cellectis] Press Release Enrollment Begun on Phase II Clinical Trial in Crohn’s Disease Cytori Therapeutics, Inc. announced enrollment of the first two patients in an investigator-initiated clinical trial of Cytori Cell Therapy™ for the treatment of the orphan indication, fistula-in-ano associated with Crohn’s Disease. [Cytori Therapeutics, Inc.] Press Release Center Will Develop Consistent Manufacturing Processes for Cell-Based Therapies A $15.7 million grant from the Marcus Foundation has helped launch a new Georgia Institute of Technology research center that will develop processes and techniques for ensuring the consistent, low-cost, large-scale manufacture of high-quality living cells used in cell-based therapies. [Georgia Institute of Technology] Press Release PCRF Launches World’s First National Tissue Bank for Pancreatic Cancer Research The world’s first national tissue bank for pancreatic cancer has launched in the UK. The Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund Tissue Bank brings together surgeons, pathologists, oncologists, researchers and database experts to co-ordinate a national – and ultimately international - resource that will help to develop new treatments and bring these to patients much faster. [Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund (PCRF)] Press Release European Commission Approves Label Variation for ADCETRIS® (Brentuximab Vedotin) to Include Data on Retreatment of Adult Patients with Relapsed or Refractory Hodgkin Lymphoma and Systemic Anaplastic Large Cell Lymphoma (sALCL) Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited announced that the European Commission has approved a Type II variation for ADCETRIS® to include data on the retreatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory (R/R) Hodgkin lymphoma or R/R sALCL who previously responded to ADCETRIS and who later relapse. [Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited] Press Release Agenus Announces Clearance of Investigational New Drug Applications by the FDA for Anti-CTLA-4 and Anti-GITR Antibodies Agenus Inc. announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared the company’s investigational new drug application for AGEN1884, an immune checkpoint modulator antibody that binds to cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen-4 (CTLA-4). [Agenus Inc.] Press Release Kadimastem Receives Patent Allowance in the United States for Its Technology in the Field of Diabetes Treatment Kadimastem announced it has received patent allowance from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, for its innovative technology in the field of diabetes treatment. The patent is for a method of producing insulin-secreting cells from stem cells, and it is likely to constitute the foundation for the company’s products in the field of stem-cell based treatment of diabetes. [Kadimastem] Press Release |