CAMBRIDGE, Mass. & SALISBURY, England--(BUSINESS WIRE)--KalVista Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: KALV), a clinical stage pharmaceutical company focused on the discovery, development, and commercialization of small molecule protease inhibitors, today announced data from a poster presentation at the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI) Congress 2018 in Munich, Germany.
“We are pleased to have developed a proprietary immunoassay to characterize the effects of our novel orally-available plasma kallikrein inhibitor, KVD900, in development for treatment of hereditary angioedema, or HAE,” said Andrew Crockett, Chief Executive Officer of KalVista. “Using this method, we are able to demonstrate that KVD900 protects high molecular weight kininogen from plasma kallikrein mediated cleavage in HAE and control plasma. We look forward to providing an update on our HAE portfolio in the next few months.”
HAE is a rare genetic disease associated with intermittent attacks of vasogenic edema. This edema is mediated by excessive plasma kallikrein (PK)-mediated cleavage of high molecular weight kininogen (HK), resulting in the overproduction of bradykinin. Previous reports have shown that changes in plasma HK levels provide a clinically useful biomarker for HAE attacks and efficacy of therapeutics. There are currently no automated methods to quantify HK in plasma. KalVista developed a high throughput and semi-automated capillary-based immunoassay for the quantification of HK in human plasma. Using this new method, we demonstrate that our novel orally-available PK inhibitor, KVD900, provides dose dependent protection against HK cleavage in both HAE and heathy control human plasma in which PK is activated ex vivo with dextran sulfate. In enzyme assays, we demonstrate that the Ki of KVD900 in 3 nanomolar (nM) against purified human plasma and its IC50 is 19 nM against plasma kallikrein in a plasma assay.
KVD900 is currently being studied in a Phase 1 trial in healthy volunteers to evaluate the safety, tolerability and exposure of the drug candidate. Plasma-based assays for PK will be used to assess its pharmacodynamic effects.
About KalVista Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
KalVista Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a pharmaceutical company focused on the discovery, development, and commercialization of small molecule protease inhibitors for diseases with significant unmet need. The initial focus is on inhibitors of plasma kallikrein, which is an important component of the body’s inflammatory response and which, in excess, can lead to increased vascular permeability, edema and inflammation. KalVista has developed a proprietary portfolio of novel, small molecule plasma kallikrein inhibitors initially targeting hereditary angioedema (HAE) and diabetic macular edema (DME). The Company has created a structurally diverse portfolio of oral plasma kallikrein inhibitors and is advancing multiple drug candidates into Phase 1 clinical trials for HAE. KalVista’s most advanced program, an intravitreally administered plasma kallikrein inhibitor known as KVD001, has successfully completed its first-in-human study in patients with DME and began a Phase 2 clinical trial in 2017.
For more information, please visit www.kalvista.com.
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