CanWell Pharma Inc., a leading venture-backed biopharmaceutical company developing innovative immunotherapies for cancer, and UbiVac, Inc., a US clinical stage immunotherapy company, today announced an exclusive license agreement to develop and commercialize UbiVac’s first-in-class cancer vaccine DPV-001 to treat cancers in Greater China.
Under the agreement, CanWell is responsible for development and commercialization of DPV-001 in Head and Neck, Breast, and Non-Small Cell Lung Cancers in Greater China. UbiVac is responsible for manufacturing and product supply. UbiVac is entitled to receive upfront and milestone payments and royalties.
DPV-001 is a first-in-class cancer vaccine that exploits autophagy to educate the immune system to destroy cancer cells. When used in combination with other immunotherapies such as immune checkpoint inhibitors and T cell agonists, DPV-001 significantly augments anticancer immunity in preclinical models. DPV-001 is currently being evaluated in two US clinical Ph1b/PhII studies by UbiVac and its collaborators, for the safety, tolerability, and preliminary efficacy in patients with advanced tumors.
About UbiVac
UbiVac is a US privately held, clinical stage immunotherapy company engaged in the research and development of therapeutic vaccines and adoptive cellular therapies to combat cancer. With innovative, first-in-class platform technology that couples an off-the-shelf DC-targeted cancer vaccine with more than 100 cancer antigens for most adenocarcinomas and squamous cell cancers, UbiVac’s cancer vaccine DPV-001 is highly complementary to current and developing drugs in the markets. UbiVac also has a pipeline of vaccines and cell therapies under development to target advanced cancers, COVID-19, and to prevent cancer in patients at high risk of developing disease. Founded by Dr. Bernard A. Fox, Dr. Hong-Ming Hu, and Mr. Bernard A. Fox, III, UbiVac is a spin-out of the Robert W. Franz Cancer Center, Earle A. Chiles Research Institute at Providence Portland Medical Center.
About UbiVac’s DPV-001
DPV-001 is a dendritic cell-targeted microvesicle containing short-lived proteins that are thought to represent the dominant HLA-presented epitopes on the surface of cancer cells. These microvesicles are packaged with multiple TLR and NOD agonists, together with 15 DAMPs and chaperones. The microvesicle vaccine also contains more than 100 proteins that are overexpressed by the average breast cancer, head and neck cancer and non-small cell lung cancer, and as many as 1700 altered peptide ligands that can augment immunity against cancer antigens. Together this formulation drives B cells, CD4 and CD8 T cells, as well as innate components of the host’s immune system, to mediate anticancer function.
In preclinical models this vaccine can convert tumors that are considered “cold” because they lack immune cells into tumors that are “hot” with cancer killer cells. This is important as many human tumors are thought to be unresponsive to immunotherapy because they lack immune cells capable of recognizing their cancer and are considered to be “cold” tumors. UbiVac and its partners are currently conducting ph1b/II clinical studies in the US for the treatment of several major solid tumors.
Contact:
CanWell Pharma Inc.