Leukemia & Lymphoma Society investments support immunotherapy for blood cancers
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The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s therapy acceleration program announced five investments intended to hasten development of immunotherapies to treat blood cancers.
The therapy acceleration program (TAP) is a strategic philanthropy funding initiative that makes individual investments of up to $10 million to speed development of high-risk, innovative therapeutics for leukemia, lymphoma and multiple myeloma. The funding supports late-stage preclinical studies, as well as proof-of-concept or registrational clinical trials.
“We are very proud of our role in bringing groundbreaking immunotherapies to patients, including chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy,” Louis DeGennaro, PhD, the society’s president and CEO, said in a press release. “Our TAP venture philanthropy initiative is investing in the next generation of immunotherapies to find cancer treatments that are even more effective, safer, longer-lasting, easier to use and active against more types of cancer.”
Three TAP-supported therapies have been approved in the United States since 2017.
“TAP partnership provides companies with deep blood cancer expertise and increases their credibility with the investment community,” Lore Gruenbaum, PhD, the program’s vice president, said in the release. “We look forward to our ongoing partnerships with these five companies as we work together to provide new hope for patients.”
This round of investments will support the following companies:
- Caribou Biosciences Inc. — The company uses next-generation CRISPR genome editing technology to develop off-the-shelf CAR T-cell therapies for hard-to-treat blood cancers. Its lead therapeutic candidate — CB-010, which targets the CD19 protein — is in a phase 1 clinical trial for treatment of patients with relapsed or refractory non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The company is developing additional off-the-shelf CAR T-cell therapies that target BCMA and CD371 proteins.
- NexImmune — The company’s artificial immune modulation platform uses nanoparticles to activate T cells to fight specific types of cancer. Two novel products are in phase 1 trials. NEXI-001 is designed to treat advanced acute myeloid leukemia or myelodysplastic syndrome, and NEXI-002 is designed to treat advanced multiple myeloma.
- Immune-Onc Therapeutics — The company is developing a novel type of myeloid immune checkpoint inhibitor. Its lead candidate — IO-202, an antibody that targets the leukocyte immunoglobulin-like receptor subfamily B — is in a phase 1 trial for treatment of advanced AML or chronic myelomonocytic leukemia. The company also intends to evaluate the agent for treatment of solid tumors.
- CARISMA Therapeutics — The company is developing CAR-engineered macrophages to treat solid tumors. Enrollment is underway for a phase 1 trial of CT-0508, a HER2-targeted CAR macrophage.
- Abintus Bio — The company is developing in vivo CAR therapies that allow for CAR T cells to be generated directly in a patient’s body, eliminating the need for collection, engineering and reinfusion. The technology is in preclinical testing.
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