Apexigen

About Apexigen

Apexigen is a biopharmaceutical product development company advancing a pipeline of novel product candidates with the potential to address life-threatening and difficult to treat diseases. The company’s proprietary technology platform enables the discovery and development of superior antibody product candidates that are able to impact previously inaccessible disease mechanisms.
While many companies are working to develop antibody therapies based on mouse- or human-derived antibody technologies, Apexigen is pioneering a movement into therapeutics based on rabbit-derived humanized monoclonal antibodies as a means of providing therapeutic benefits that have not been achieved through the use of other technologies.
Several blockbuster antibody drugs have been developed with existing mouse and human antibody technologies and display libraries. However, the development of the next generation of antibody-based drugs will require capabilities that exceed those of current technologies in order to bind rare or intractable antigen epitopes and to exert novel effects on disease processes. The key to these next generation therapeutics lies in harnessing the inherent advantages of rabbit antibodies, which have been used successfully in research settings for decades. These advantages are the result of rabbit’s ability to generate a much greater diversity of unique high quality antibodies - with high affinity, high specificity and which bind unique antigen epitopes. These attributes enable the discovery of antibodies that are capable of targeting previously unreachable disease mechanisms.
The company’s proprietary platform technology has allowed Apexigen to build a strong and broad pipeline of seven unique humanized monoclonal antibody programs spanning indications including oncology, inflammatory disease and ophthalmology. Of these seven candidates, four are currently the subject of development partnerships with leading life science companies.
Apexigen’s most advanced internal development program, APX005, is a humanized monoclonal antibody targeting the CD40 protein for the treatment of cancers. Apexigen believes that CD40-induced activation of the immune system by APX005 has the potential to treat a variety of difficult to treat cancers, such as pancreatic cancer, and has exhibited potent anti-tumor effects in animal models.
Collaboration is one of Apexigen’s strengths. At present, seven corporate collaborations are in place, representing both product development collaborations and antibody technology collaborations. Through the building of successful collaborations, Apexigen is able to develop a broad base of antibody products and promote wider use of its antibody technology platform.