Shares of France’s TxCell S.A. have skyrocketed about 150 percent this morning after Sangamo Therapeutics announced it was acquiring a majority stake in the company for €72 million (about $82 million) in a cash deal.
Shares of France’s TxCell S.A. have skyrocketed about 150 percent this morning after Sangamo Therapeutics announced it was acquiring a majority stake in the company for €72 million (about $82 million) in a cash deal.
Sangamo Therapeutics, based in Richmond, Calif., said it was attracted to TxCell due to that company’s research in regulatory T cell (Treg) development for immunological diseases. That area is one of the key focuses for Sangamo’s proprietary product pipeline. Tregs are a naturally occurring subset of T cells and are critical for maintaining immune homeostasis within the body by induction and maintenance of tolerance to self-antigens.
TxCell has been focused on the development of Chimeric Antigen Receptor Treg Cells (CAR-Treg) for immunotherapy of severe chronic autoimmune and inflammatory diseases as well as organ Transplantation. TxCell is targeting a range of autoimmune diseases (both T-cell and B-cell-mediated) including Crohn’s disease, lupus nephritis, bullous pemphigoid and multiple sclerosis, as well as transplantation-related inflammatory disorders. Sangamo said it intends to evaluate the potential of CAR-Treg therapies to prevent graft rejection in solid organ transplant and for the treatment of autoimmune diseases such as Crohn’s disease and multiple sclerosis.
Sangamo Chief Executive Officer Sandy Macrae said the acquisition will combine TxCell’s Treg expertise with the company’s ex vivo gene editing capabilities, which would make Sangamo a leader in the “emerging field of CAR-Treg cell therapy.”
“We believe CAR-Treg therapies will prove to be as exciting for immunology as CAR-T has been for oncology,” Macrae said in a statement.
The acquisition of TxCell will accelerate Sangamo’s plans to place a CAR-Treg therapy in the clinic. The company anticipates submitting a clinical trial authorization application in Europe for TxCell’s first CAR-Treg investigational product candidate for solid organ transplant in 2019. Also, the company said it plans to launch a Phase I/II trial later this year.
Also, Sangamo said it will use its zinc finger nuclease (ZFN) gene-editing technology to develop next-generation autologous and allogeneic CAR-Treg cell therapies for use in treating autoimmune diseases. That is something that Stephane Boissel, TxCell’s CEO, is excited about. He said they believe Sangamo’s ZFN-editing technology will “facilitate the precise genetic modifications needed to create a new class of Treg-based antigen and tissue-specific immunosuppressive medicines.”
“Progressing such CAR-Treg products in clinical development and towards commercialization would require expertise and financial resources that were impossible for us to get as a stand-alone business at a reasonable cost,” Boissel added.
Under terms of the deal, Sangamo will acquire all outstanding ordinary shares of TxCell, at a price of €2.58 per share in cash. TxCell will be a subsidiary of Sangamo operating under the name Sangamo Therapeutics SA. Following the completion of the squeeze-out procedure, Sangamo intends to delist TxCell. The company’s operations will remain based in Valbonne, France, according to the announcement.
