(Oxford, UK, 26 March 2014) Immunocore Limited, the biotechnology company developing novel biological drugs called ImmTACs, today announced a re-organisation of its executive management team. The changes are designed to support the continuing growth of Immunocore and its sister company, Adaptimmune. Both companies have recently experienced rapid growth based on encouraging clinical trials results.
James Noble, the founding Chief Executive Officer of both Immunocore and Adaptimmune, will become full-time Chief Executive Officer of Adaptimmune as of 31 March. Mr Noble will remain on the Immunocore board as a non-executive director to help steer the company’s future success.
Dr Jonathan Knowles, currently Executive Chairman of both Immunocore and Adaptimmune will serve as acting CEO of Immunocore until the company’s board appoints a permanent replacement.
Immunocore entered into three major partnerships during the second half of 2013 with GlaxoSmithKline, Genentech and MedImmune, the global biologics and research arm of AstraZeneca, which has further accelerated its planned expansion. Adaptimmune has multiple clinical trials in progress in the United States, generating promising results. European trials will shortly commence and the company recently announced that it is taking a second T cell-based therapy into clinical trials in 2015, supported by a major grant from the Technology Strategy Board.
James Noble commented: “Both companies are at the stage where they each require a full-time CEO to lead further development. Having been part of the recent success in Immunocore, where we have secured three significant partnerships and progressed our clinical programme IMCgp100 into a Phase IIa trial in melanoma, I look forward to focusing on further accelerating the growth of Adaptimmune based on its recent clinical successes in a number of different cancers. The goal for Adaptimmune now is to finalise a major partnership while expanding its operations to drive the internal pipeline of the company.”
Jonathan Knowles said: “It is a real pleasure to be associated with the success of Immunocore and Adaptimmune in parallel, and I would like to acknowledge the very significant achievement of James in leading both companies up to this point. I am delighted that James has agreed to take on the full-time CEO position at Adaptimmune while remaining on the Immunocore board as a non-executive director. I look forward to continuing to work closely with James and the teams in Adaptimmune and Immunocore as we enter the next phase of growth for both companies and seek to bring breakthrough cancer therapies to patients.”
Contact
Margaret Henry
PR Consultant
Immunocore Ltd, UK
T: + 44 (0) 1865 261491
M: + 44 (0) 7771 377363
E: m.henry@oxin.co.uk
IMCgp100 - Killing cancer - video available on request
A video is available on request which shows melanoma cancer cells (red) being killed by T cells (blue) when activated by the drug, IMCgp100 (a melanoma specific ImmTAC). Healthy cells (green) are ignored and left undamaged.
The video can be viewed at: http://www.immunocore.com/technology/cancer-killing/
About Immunocore
Founded in 2008, Immunocore Ltd is a privately owned, clinical-stage biotechnology company developing a highly innovative platform technology that generates novel drugs called ImmTACs for the treatment of cancer and viral infection. Immunocore traces its roots to Avidex Ltd, founded in 1999 as a spin-out from the University of Oxford to develop novel T Cell Receptor technology invented by the founder and chief scientist, Dr Bent Jakobsen.
Immunocore has major discovery collaborations with leading pharmaceutical companies Genentech, GlaxoSmithKline and MedImmune, part of AstraZeneca. The company was listed in the top 15 private biotech firms globally for 2013 by Fierce Biotech and named Best Biotech Dealmaker of 2013 at the OBN Awards. Immunocore has approximately 100 staff and is located in Abingdon, Oxfordshire. For more information, please visit www.immunocore.com
About ImmTACs
Immunocore’s ImmTAC (Immune mobilising mTCR Against Cancer) technology enables the immune system to recognise and kill cancer or viral cells. T Cell Receptors naturally recognise diseased cells and Immunocore’s competitive advantage is its ability to engineer high affinity T Cell Receptors and link them to an antibody fragment which can activate the immune system to kill the targeted cancer or viral cells. These bi-specific proteins, called ImmTACS, have the potential to be extremely potent anti-cancer or anti-viral agents.
About IMCgp100
IMCgp100 is a novel bi-specific immunotherapeutic for the treatment of malignant melanoma and is currently in Phase IIa clinical trials in the US and UK. The product comprises an affinity-enhanced soluble T cell receptor (TCR) specific for the HLA-A2 restricted melanoma-associated antigen gp100, fused to an anti-CD3 single chain antibody fragment (scFv). A scalable and cost effective manufacturing process has been established.
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