Genentech expands immuno-oncology collaboration with Bicycle Therapeutics

USA – Roche Group member Genentech has expanded the exclusive strategic partnership agreement with British biotech Bicycle Therapeutics by exercising its second option to commence a new program to develop and commercialize novel Bicycle-based immuno-oncology therapies.

Bicycle is based on technology that was previously used to attach toxins to innate immune activators, resulting in drugs that deliver payloads to cancer cells and trigger immune attacks within tumors.

Since then, the biotech has begun using the platform to develop T-cell modulators that it believes improve on the safety and efficacy of existing modalities while also being better suited for use in combination.

The companies are working on discovering and conducting pre-clinical development of new immunotherapies for various targets.

The initial agreement was signed in February 2020 for discovering, developing and marketing new immuno-oncology therapies based on Bicycle’s bicyclic peptide technology.

Under the deal, the companies are working on discovering and conducting pre-clinical development of new immunotherapies based on Bicycle technology against various targets.

As per the 2020 agreement, Genentech received two partnership expansion options, each of which offered the company the right to include one further program in the partnership for a payment of US$10m to Bicycle.

Bicycle is based on technology that was previously used to attach toxins to innate immune activators, resulting in drugs that deliver payloads to cancer cells and trigger immune attacks within tumors.

Genentech exercised its first expansion option in October last year and now exercised the second option, resulting in further payment of US$10m.

The agreement is exclusive of the compounds in the oncology pipeline of Bicycle, including its immuno-oncology candidates.

Bicycle Therapeutics CEO Kevin Lee said: “We are pleased both with the ongoing progress in our collaboration with the preeminent immuno-oncology team at Genentech and that Genentech has once again elected to exercise an option to add a new program.

This represents the second expansion option exercised by Genentech under the terms of our collaboration agreement, and we believe this highlights the potential of Bicycles across a wide range of targets.”

The companies will continue the partnership for developing potential new cancer therapies based on Bicycle technology.

A biotechnology company, Bicycle has a differentiated class of therapies based on its bicyclic peptide technology.

In September last year, Genentech and Adaptimmune Therapeutics entered a strategic partnership and license agreement for developing and marketing allogeneic cell therapies for treating multiple cancer indications.

Meanwhile, Genentech has released a two-year data that confirms faricimab (Vabysmo) improves vision for patients diagnosed with wet-AMD, a leading cause of vision loss.

The primary analyses at 1 year formed the basis of the recent wet AMD approvals in the US, Japan, the UK and several other countries around the world. Faricimab is also approved in these countries for diabetic macular edema (DME).

According to Genentech, faricimab is currently under review by the European Medicines Agency for these conditions, and submissions to other regulatory authorities around the world are ongoing.

Faricimab is the first bispecific antibody for the eye and the only injectable eye medicine approved by the FDA with the option for treatments from one to four months apart in the first year following four initial monthly loading doses, based on evaluation of the patient’s anatomy and vision outcomes.

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