LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--T-Cure Bioscience, Inc., a privately held company focused on developing autologous T cell receptor (TCR) therapy products for the treatment of solid tumors, today announced that the Company has entered into an exclusive, worldwide license with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) for intellectual property related to a TCR-based product candidate for the treatment of tumors expressing Kita-Kyushu lung cancer antigen 1 (KK-LC-1), for the treatment of KK-LC-1-expressing malignancies, such as gastric, lung, and breast cancers. T-Cure anticipates the KK-LC-1 TCR therapy will enter a multi-site Phase 1 clinical study in the second quarter of 2020 under the direction of Christian S. Hinrichs, M.D., Principal Investigator at the Experimental Transplantation and Immunology Branch (ETIB) at NCI.
To support the preclinical and clinical research to develop the TCR product and future products targeting KK-LC-1, T-Cure has entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the NCI. Under the CRADA, T-Cure will work to identify additional therapy candidates targeting KK-LC-1 using the Company’s proprietary TCR discovery platform, iSORT™. The Company also intends to conduct an independent Phase 1 clinical trial in 2021 to further assess the safety and efficacy of the licensed KK-LC-1 TCR.
“The KK-LC-1 TCR technology forms the foundation of a new treatment strategy for a certain common, difficult to treat cancers,” stated NCI’s Dr. Hinrichs.
“We are extremely excited to work with Dr. Hinrichs and his team at NCI to advance this novel TCR product candidate through preclinical and clinical development,” stated Gang Zeng, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of T-Cure. “Dr. Hinrichs’ extensive experience in the discovery and development of novel adoptive T-cell therapies for cancer will be invaluable as we advance this program. Of note, the TCR was isolated from the tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes of a patient who had a complete response to an immunotherapy without any toxicities. As a result, we believe it holds great promise for engineering patients’ immune cells to effectively target and destroy cancer cells without harming healthy tissue.”
About T-Cure Bioscience, Inc.
T-Cure Bioscience, Inc. is an innovative immuno-oncology company committed to delivering effective and durable cell therapies for the treatment of cancer. The Company focuses on isolating high avidity TCR that can be used to engineer a patient’s T cells to effectively target and destroy solid tumors. The Company maintains a pipeline of TCR under clinical and pre-clinical development targeting HERV-E, KK-LC-1, NY-ESO-1 and other antigens associated with solid tumors with significant unmet medical needs, including kidney cancer, breast cancer, lung cancer, gastric cancer, ovarian cancer, liver cancer, pancreatic cancer, sarcoma, and glioblastoma.
More information is available at www.T-Cure.com.
Forward Looking Statements
T-Cure cautions you that all statements, other than statements of historical facts, contained in this press release, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause our or our industry’s actual results, levels or activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from those anticipated by such statements. The use of words such as “may”, “might”, “will”, “should”, “could”, “expect”, “plan”, “anticipate”, “believe”, “estimate”, “project”, “intend”, “future”, “potential” or “continue”, and other similar expressions are intended to identify forward looking statements. For example, all statements we make regarding (i) the initiation, timing, cost, progress and results of our preclinical and clinical studies and our research and development programs, (ii) our ability to advance product candidates into, and successfully complete, clinical studies, (iii) the timing or likelihood of regulatory filings and approvals, (iv) our ability to develop, manufacture and commercialize our product candidates and to improve the manufacturing process, (v) the rate and degree of market acceptance of our product candidates, (vi) the size and growth potential of the markets for our product candidates and our ability to serve those markets, and (vii) our expectations regarding our ability to obtain and maintain intellectual property protection for our product candidates, are forward looking. All forward-looking statements are based on current estimates, assumptions and expectations by our management that, although we believe to be reasonable, are inherently uncertain. All forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those that we expected. Any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it was made. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.
