Neon Therapeutics Enters License Agreement With Sanquin Blood Supply Foundation For Peptide-MHC Assay Technology

Assay Technology to be Utilized to Evaluate Immune Responses in Upcoming Company-Sponsored Trial to Commence in 2016

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. & AMSTERDAM--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Neon Therapeutics, an immuno-oncology company developing neoantigen-based therapeutic vaccines and T cell therapies to treat cancer, today announced that the company has entered into a license agreement with Sanquin Blood Supply Foundation for technology to be utilized across Neon Therapeutics’ pipeline.

“Neon Therapeutics is honored to leverage the leading work of our co-founder Dr. Schumacher and his colleagues and to utilize this technology across our portfolio, including in our upcoming Phase 1b clinical trial evaluating our personalized neoantigen vaccine, NEO-PV-01”

The technology utilizes ultraviolet light-based exchange for fast and simple generation of large series of peptide-MHC complexes for in vitro and ex vivo detection and characterization of antigen-specific T cells. This technology was invented in part by Neon co-founder Ton Schumacher, Ph.D., senior member of the Department of Immunology and deputy director of The Netherlands Cancer Institute. Neon Therapeutics plans to utilize the rapid UV-exchange tetramer technology to assay immunological activity for its cancer vaccines and T cell therapies, which will use both fully personalized and shared neoantigen targets. This technology is co-owned by Sanquin and The Netherlands Cancer Institute, and both institutes have jointly developed the peptide-MHC based assays and reagents in recent years.

“Sanquin is proud that its proprietary technologies support the development of pioneering immunotherapies, which could empower the patient’s own immune system,” said Roel Melsert, managing director at Sanquin.

“Neon Therapeutics is honored to leverage the leading work of our co-founder Dr. Schumacher and his colleagues and to utilize this technology across our portfolio, including in our upcoming Phase 1b clinical trial evaluating our personalized neoantigen vaccine, NEO-PV-01,” said Cary Pfeffer, M.D., interim chief executive officer of Neon Therapeutics. “Licensing such leading technologies will ensure Neon Therapeutics remains at the forefront in tumor immunology and neoantigen biology, ultimately benefiting patients by allowing us to optimize anti-tumor responses.”

About Neon Therapeutics

Neon Therapeutics is an immuno-oncology company focused on developing novel therapeutics leveraging neoantigen biology to treat cancer. A neoantigen-based product engine will allow Neon to develop further treatment modalities including next-generation vaccines and T cell therapies targeting both personalized as well as shared neoantigens. Neon Therapeutics’ lead program is a personalized neoantigen vaccine that builds upon years of research and development at the Broad Institute and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and is already in multiple clinical trials. For more information, please visit www.neontherapeutics.com.

About Sanquin

The Sanquin Blood Supply Foundation is responsible for blood supply on a not-for-profit basis and prepares advanced transfusion medicine and cellular therapies, fulfilling the highest demands for quality, safety and efficiency. Sanquin prepares and produces plasma pharmaceuticals from blood and plasmaphaeresis donations. By virtue of its research and diagnostic laboratories and its reagents unit, Sanquin develops, manufactures and sells a broad range of blood grouping and immune reagents, including several innovative products for diagnostic uses and for fundamental and clinical research.. Sanquin makes it extensive expertise and in-house research on blood and immunology also available via contract services, for example, in production of cellular therapies and monitoring the effects of immunotherapies, vaccines and biologicals. For more information about the organization, please visit www.sanquin.nl. For more information about the MHC technology, please visit www.sanquin.nl/en/products-services/reagents/product-categories/cell-therapy/.

About the Netherlands Cancer Institute

The Netherlands Cancer Institute (NKI) was established on October 10, 1913. It has been at the international forefront of cancer care and research ever since. The unique combination of health care and scientific research within the same institute offers great benefit for cancer patients. Today, the Netherlands Cancer Institute accommodates approximately 650 scientists and scientific support personnel. The NKI’s cancer clinic, the Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Hospital, has 185 medical specialists, 220 beds, an out-patient clinic that receives 27,000 patients each year, 12 operating theaters and 11 radiotherapy units. It is the only dedicated cancer center in The Netherlands and maintains an important role as a national and international center of scientific and clinical expertise, development and training. For more information, please visit www.nki.nl.