Member Info for Burble

If they applied to the MHRA for ethical approval then yes. But as with any clinical trial, you've got to have the thing fully costed, with a clinical trials unit to back you, all the necessary paperwork in place (consent, patient information leaflets, protocols etc). Then you have to go through each individual NHS R&D department to get them to sign off on the trial, allocate staffing time etc to it.

The number of processes and things that have to be in place prior to a clinical trial opening are tremendous. A standard clinical trial probably takes upwards of a year to be designed, approved and signed off and that's multiple people working on it full-time. It's not as simple as just asking people to sign a piece of paperwork.

As somebody who has sat on MHRA ethics committees, and submits to them regularly, the time it takes to get a trial started (even a very basic trial) is colossal. Generally for our ethics for a non-CTIMP trial, in 20 hospitals across the UK takes routinely 6-12 months to get everything signed off. For a CTIMP trial this could be longer and for CTIMP challenge trial it wouldnt surprise me if timelines are stretched even further. Though I would add the caveat that currently ethics committees are prioritising all C-19 trials, hence it may take less time to go through than we would appreciate normally.

If ethics approve it then yes it is ethical. We have challenge trials going on all the time with the likes of FluCamp etc.

Generally the population that are exposed will be screened for underlying health conditions, but as with any clinical trial there are risks involved and the disclaimers for this can be as long as your arm. The problem here in the UK currently is that there are relatively low numbers of actively infected C-19 patients so trials are unable to actually get significant data to see whether they are effective. You'd want to try this in somewhere like the US at the moment, but there is obviously difficulties getting ethical agreements over there at short notice. One thing I would add, is that if I were to do a challenge trial, I'd rather do it in a hospital in the UK - at least it wouldn't bankrupt you if you ended up in ICU!

Difficult to say, when I have heard him speak I feel that he is able to deliver straight talking, not too technical language with confidence in the science behind it. However, I don't think overall the actual sales/licencing side of the business is as strong as it could be. At a sp of just over 5p, this IMHO should be far higher based on the science. However, biotechs are notorious for having a high cash burn and low chance of getting a product right through to market. Hence, I think if there were ways to generate an income that is relatively stable, even if it is small transactions that would be better. Take when we sold antibodies to generate cash, that was beneficial and I wonder whether more of this could happen. Obviously, science takes money and money helps create science - at times it feels like a catch-22. However, to break out of that cycle, you need a strong focus on the sales/licencing side of things.

Thinking aloud here, if SCLP were able to show that their COVIDITY vaccine worked well for Covid-19, could this open the door to the technology being used more broadly in the virology marketplace - so thinking along the lines of HCV, Flu, HPV etc. In turn, rather than selling everything as a single hit, the licensing model for the immunobody platform would be far more attractive for other companies. Data from 2003 (albeit it's nearly 20 years old), suggests that the respiratory non-flu virus market alone is $40 billion annually (direct costs, $17 billion per year; and indirect costs, $22.5 billion per year), meaning as a market the viral sector is probably equally as attractive as the oncology sector.

Just noticed that SCLP has retweeted this.

They're giving the keynote speech at the Immuno UK 2020 virtual event. Have signed up to free pass so should be able to see the keynote sometimes it does help to be an academic.

https://twitter.com/ImmunoOncConf/status/1278240451607384064?s=20

I have noticed recently that SCLP retweet posts. They were quick to retweet my post earlier (o_burbidge) which was interesting. I definitely think there is more a stronger media presence than historically, though I wonder what it will be which helps them really move the business forward. The science is there, I just wonder whether they will struggle due to the cashburn and high cost of clinical trials without partners. It wouldn't surprise me if they are savvy and licence certain platforms rather than take to market themselves, royalties will help move the rest of the pipeline forward at a stronger pace than trying to spread the funds more thinly.

That's good that I'm not the only one who feels this needs raising. Thank you for highlighting this - the more places that vaccines are advertised the better. Then it can be upto the market/science to determine which is the better option!

Definitely liking the nucleocapsid and spike protein design of this. Plus it's scalable relatively easily.

I noticed that there is absolutely no mention of the COVIDITY vaccine on the WHO landscape for COVID-19 vaccines. I just sent an email to Scancell asking why this may be. It seems such a shame that their input and potential achievements are overlooked by the fact that they are not recognised by anyone. It seems that they are very much flying under the radar at the moment both for institutions, investors and the general public.

https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/draft-landscape-of-covid-19-candidate-vaccines

The WHO was updated on the 12th, it surprises me that COVIDITY is not listed on there at all.

A poignant news article discussing usher syndrome - a target of which Oxb have included in their pipeline with UshStat. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-ouch-33101671

Random question Andy, what is the legal standing of sending them an FOI to release both the numbers for voting AND the audited accounts for the last five years? Is there a legal requirement to fulfil a requested FOI as this is a company trading within the UK markets?