Cambridge, UK and Porto, Portugal, 6 April 2016 – Abzena plc (AIM: ABZA, ‘Abzena’), a life sciences group providing services and technologies enabling the development and manufacture of biopharmaceutical products and FairJourney Biologics (‘FJB’), a global antibody discovery and engineering company, provide further information on their marketing alliance.
On 9 March 2016, Abzena announced it had formed a marketing alliance with FJB as part of its drive to continue to expand its range of offerings. This alliance enables Abzena to offer antibody discovery services to its partners and FJB to offer immunogenicity assessment and analytical services to its clients. Abzena will also offer its cell line development, process development and manufacturing services to FJB’s customers. The combined offering from both companies will provide a continuum of services from antibody discovery to GMP manufacture for Phase I and II clinical trials.
FJB has developed multiple naïve and immune Fab phage display libraries and can provide rodent, llama or human antibodies in Fab, IgG or, in the case of llama, VHH format, against customers’ targets. Bespoke libraries can also be constructed and used exclusively for particular customers. FJB undertakes binding and functional assays on antibody candidates and, through Abzena, will be able to offer an enhanced range of assays, including assessment of immunogenic potential, to aid selection of lead product candidates.
Both FJB and Abzena offer protein engineering services to provide customers and partners with antibodies tailored to the desired format and humanized. Abzena uses its proprietary Composite Human Antibody™ technology to produce antibodies with a very low risk of triggering an unwanted immunogenic response in patients - there are currently 11 Composite Human Antibodies™ being progressed through clinical development by Abzena’s partners.
Abzena can develop the manufacturing cell lines for antibodies discovered by FJB and provide process development and GMP manufacture of the antibodies at its facility in San Diego. Any antibodies being developed as an antibody drug conjugate (ADC) can be linked to a range of different drugs using Abzena’s proprietary conjugation technology, ThioBridge™, as well as other established methods. ADCs are produced and tested by Abzena at its facilities in Cambridge (UK) and Bristol (PA, USA).
Dr Sally Waterman, Senior Vice President of Corporate Development at Abzena, commented:
“This alliance provides our partners with access to strong antibody discovery expertise, in combination with our existing immunogenicity testing, protein engineering and manufacturing capabilities. It means that we can support the development of better therapeutic products by our partners from discovery right through to manufacture for clinical trials.”
Maria Pajuelo, CSO at FairJourney Biologics, said:
“Through Abzena we are now able to offer a wider range of services and give our customers the option to take discovery projects to the next stage. We believe that this will bring real benefits to our customers and facilitate the efficient delivery of novel products to patients.”
