Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
I have no idea whether this has already been posted but in case it hasn't, Samantha Paston will be presenting on behalf of Scancell at the conference below to be held in September in Amsterdam. Since joining Scancell from Immunocore she's kept a low profile so good to see her name amongst the speakers.
https://oxfordglobal.com/biologics/events/mrna-vaccines-oligonucleotide-therapies-2024
Cleanerworld
I'm not sure you have understood my post.
I didn't say the conference wasn't relevant, nor did I say that the fact that Sarah Danson is involved in other trials is a negative - quite the opposite in fact. I simply believe that it's not the forum for presenting new data and those building up expectations may be disappointed. Worth noting that the deadlines for abstract submissions for both AACR and ASCO have now passed, although I think ASCO late breaking deadline isn't until March. If the SCIB1 results are as good as we hope and expect, these are the sort of platforms Scancell will be hoping to use and of course they must present previously unpublished data.
Excellent news, from memory this is the 5th deal from Redx (including Pirtobrutinib). $10m upfront and total potential value of up to $870m. Next milestone will be clearance of the IND but Jazz will pay Redx to carry out the preclinical development to take it to that stage thereby generating more revenue and giving some element of control.
Ee - recruitment of a good CFO with appropriate life sciences experience can't be easy so much better to take their time and find the right person.
Burble - thanks for that, much appreciated.
Ee
Regarding the composition of the Board, it will be interesting to see but Sally's departure has no impact on Audit/Remuneration/Nominations committees so they don't have to replace her and can probably quite comfortably continue as they are. I still think at some stage it would be good to have a CFO on the board.
As for WG Partners, I know they acted as joint bookrunner in last placing, but they're not listed on Scancell's website as joint broker and I understood the appointment of a broker had to be notified. Unless I've missed that announcement, they simply seem to have appeared at the bottom of RNS's as joint broker.
Unless the RNS has been poorly worded, Dr Callum Scott is being appointed as Head of Development, but he's not being appointed to the BOD, so this isn't a board position. This was also the case with the recent CFO and Head of Business Development appointments. So the question is whether they are looking to replace Sally in terms of nos. on the board or are they happy to run with just the Chairman and 4 directors?
I'm sure I must have missed it, but does anyone know when Scancell announced the appointment of WG Partners as joint broker?
BOJO,
The neoadjuvant study gives Scancell anopportunity to understand exactly how Modi1 is performing at a molecular level, to see and provide hard evidence of the mechanism of action and to ensure that the vaccine is performing as expected in the following ways:-
1) It will tell them what sort of immune response each patient has generated - ie.exacly which epitopes have they responded to. How many patients have responded to all 3 peptides, just 2, 1 or zero? This will give them confidence that they have selected the best combination of vimentin and enolase peptides and that one isn't dominating the others.
2) What type of T cell response was generated in terms CD4/CD8 and were they actually killing tumour cells?
3) They will be looking at which patients responded the best and was there any common biomarker to identify them? Obviously the ability to predict responders would be very useful for future patient selction.
4) Perhaps most importantly they will be comparing the response of patients treated with Modi1 as a monotherapy with those treated with Modi1 in combination with checkpoint inhibitors.
In addition to safety, the whole point of a phase I/IIa trial is to learn how the drug performs in the human body, whether it merits further development and to inform the design of the next stage of trials. Obviously the results from the neoadjuvant study will be invaluable in helping to achieve this.
That's about the limit of my non-scientist understanding, but I'm sure Lindy would be more than happy to answer directly if you email her.
BOJO
Thanks - definitely worth listening to again. Lindy was very precise, the new patent application is for SCIB1 with checkpoints. Probably the single most important detail from the whole presentation for me. The short patent life of SCIB1 is an issue that hasn't really been discussed but was always there in the background. It wasn't just the impact on the valuation of SCIB1 but also essentially meant that the whole future of the ImmunoBody platform relied on successful results from the iSCIB1+ cohort of patients. This new patent application means that Scancell are not totally dependent on iSCIB1+ and it also could have relevance for the timing and valuation of any potential partnership deals.
Kashdog
Thanks!! I haven't had time to catch up on all posts.
Will be Interesting to see when it's published exactly what they're covering.
Violindog,
I guess the likelihood of success is little more than a function of the stage of development and is always going to be quite low for a phase I/IIa product in advance of the full results. Having said that, I'm surprised that it is so much lower than Moditope given their relative stages of clinical development. I haven't had a chance too look back at previous valuations but can understand that at this point in time it's more difficult to value ImmunoBody. The likelihood of success for SCIB1 must be low simply due to the patent expiry date and we have yet to see any data for iSCIB1+. Hopefully all will change with full clinical results from iSCIB1+.
Can anyone here remember exactly what Lindy said about the new patent application? From memory it was for ImmunoBody and not Moditope, but did she specify whether it was SCIB1 or iSCIB1+ in combinatioin with CPIs?
A new research note with revised valuation to reflect recent fundraise has been published by TD today:- Scancell: multiple platforms and opportunities
https://www.trinitydelta.org/research-notes/heading-into-important-2024-clinical-catalysts/
Burble,
Thanks very much for taking the time and trouble to report back. Fascinating to read comments from a highly experienced expert from a top institution and certainly adds perspective.
Important to look at this in the context of the setting for these therapies. They are FDA approved, but only for patients who have either relapsed or failed to respond to other therapies. They're not a first or even second line treatments - they're an end of the road, last chance opportunity and that makes a huge difference to the risk/reward assessment. It's also worth noting this sentence:-
'The researchers noted that the “rate of T-cell malignancies observed is far lower than that seen with some other treatments.”'
The treatment landscape for blood cancers is very different from solid tumours and of course Scancell are not in that market, however it's good to see the continued oversight from the FDA and that postmarketing reporting has resulted in action.
Johnny,
It could simply be that the standard of care CPI therapy for renal cancer patients is Ipilimumab plus nivolumab which makes recruitment of patients being treated with just a single CPI problematical. The logical step would be to run a cohort to patients being treated with doublet CPI therapy.
Corr - of not in
DIBS -
It's an RNS REACH. Not sure what you expect, are you suggesting that life sciences companies shouldn't communicate out publication in peer reviewed research papers?
TwoGood2Die
LDTs don't require FDA approval as long as the lab offering it is accredited.
Sangi.
The decision to stop using HyCEAD was announced just over 6 weeks after the closure of the Canadian office. Perhaps they were simply evaluating their options and other systems before making a decision?
Re. 4D Pharma. I disappeared from 4D because I had sold and therefore had no reason to post. As stated on the twitter group, I was concerned about funding by debt and the poor execution of the NASDAQ listing. 4D had a pipeline with real potential and it's a tragedy that it will never now be taken further. Early stage biotech and debt is a bad combination. Angle of course are debt free.
As for the patent application, it was only published on 23rd December and is now moving into the national phase of examination. Not sure how it's possible for it to have been granted - do you have a link?
Sangi,
That's not my experience at all. When I noticed the terminated study I received an explanation from the Company immediately. As for the HyCEAD system, you are mistaken and must have missed the RNS from Angle when they very clearly announced that they would stop using the system and why. This is taken from that RNS:-
'The decision has also been taken to focus development of downstream molecular analysis of Parsortix harvested cancer cells to third party platforms in preference to the Company's inhouse HyCEAD Ziplex platform. The latter had proved highly sensitive and successful in analysis of Parsortix liquid biopsy samples but required significant ongoing investment to enable the assay to be offered in a product format (as opposed to being limited to provision of a service from ANGLE clinical laboratories). Meanwhile, third-party molecular platforms have greatly improved in sensitivity and reduced in cost and now offer an installed base of molecular products already in the market, which can be leveraged for new Parsortix applications.'
Wow Sangi you're busy today.
There is no issue with Angle's prostate cancer study and it is unrelated to the study you mention in your 1351 post. As BOJO has posted, Angle's Domino study in prostate cancer has completed recruitment (100 patients) and samples are awaiting/undergoing analysis. The study record you have found is refers to a separate study in a more limited patient population that Solaris were interested in carrying out and has no connection to the Angle/Solaris collaboration.