April 16, 2015
By Mark Terry, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
ThromboGenics NV , a biopharmaceutical company based in Leuven, Belgium, announced Tuesday that it is teaming up with VIB, a life sciences institute in Flanders (Belgium), to found Oncurious NV, an oncology company.
Oncurious will focus on developing TB-403 for the treatment of pediatric brain tumors. TB-403 is a monoclonal antibody that opposes placental growth factor (PIGF). PIGF is observed in several types of cancer, including medulloblastoma, a rare and life-threatening brain tumor seen mostly in children. High levels of PIGF receptor neuropilin 1 are related to poor overall survival.
Oncurious expects to start a Phase I/IIa clinical program with TB-403 in medulloblastoma patients. The company hopes to begin enrollment by the end of this year.
“The formation of Oncurious is an important development for ThromboGenics, which will allow us to even more focus our efforts on achieving our goals in the ophthalmology space,” said Patrik De Haes, chief executive officer of ThromboGenics in a statement. “This new venture should also enable an acceleration of the development of TB-403 for the treatment of medulloblastoma, a devastating cancer that affects children and adolescents.”
The research behind TB-403 and PIGF expression in medulloblastoma was first published in the journal Cell by Peter Carmeliet of VIB and Rakesh Jain of Harvard University. Medulloblastoma affects about 500 cases per year in Europe, but is very invasive and life-threatening.
In 2012, ThromboGenics and Lund, Sweden-based BioInvent regained full rights to TB-403 from Roche , after Roche reprioritized its pipeline. In 2008 Roche acquired exclusive global development rights to the compound from the two companies, and performed early clinical testing in patients with solid tumors, including liver cancers, ovarian cancers and colorectal cancer.
“This is a medical and commercial niche,” said Carmeliet in a statement. “A pharmaceutical giant will not tackle a condition such as medulloblastoma, simply because ‘the market’ is too small. That is why the launch of Oncurious is such great news. We get the opportunity to translate our research findings into clinical applications and the treatment of medulloblastoma will be significantly improved. This is a very positive and promising development for all young medulloblastoma patients.”
With the new deal, ThromboGenics will be the majority shareholder. BioInvent will act as co-development partner. ThromboGenics holds the exclusive license of TB-403 for ophthalmic indications. VIB pulls together 1,400 scientists from over 60 countries, and also acts as an entrepreneurial biotech catalyst for commercial development in pharma, agricultural and industrial applications.
“We are excited that we can jointly translate the potential of VIB research by Peter Carmeliet into a reality for patients,” said Johan Cardoen, managing director of VIB in a statement.
“We believe that TB-403 has the potential to greatly improve the treatment of medulloblastoma and a number of other pediatric tumours, an area of great medical need. This collaboration illustrates the value of excellence-driven basic research at VIB and ThromboGenics, and the pro-active approach to ‘make the difference for patients.’ We are confident that together with ThromboGenics, we can develop Oncurious into a leading oncology company.”
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