Tag: Merus
Company News: Merus appoints Mark Iwicki as President of the Supervisory Board
Merus B.V., a leader in developing best-in-class bispecific antibody therapeutics to treat cancer patients, today announced that Mark Iwicki has been appointed as President of its Supervisory Board.
Mr. Iwicki most recently served as President and Chief Executive Officer of biotechnology company Civitas Therapeutics until it was acquired by Acorda Therapeutics in 2014. Previously, Mr. Iwicki was the CEO of Blend Therapeutics and Sunovion Pharmaceuticals.
Mark will replace Gerard van Odijk who has been the company’s President of the Board for the last 7 years.
Company News: Merus and Selexis receive a € 2.1 million grant for single cell line manufacturing of a bispecific antibody combination to treat colorectal cancer
Merus B.V., a leader in developing best-in-class bispecific antibody therapeutics to treat cancer patients and Selexis SA a serial innovation company with proven technologies for biologics drug discovery and Research Cell Bank (RCB) development today announced the award of the EUREKA Eurostars grant “BiSECT” with a total budget of €2.1 million to develop bispecific antibody combination products for the treatment of colorectal cancer.
In the program, Merus and Selexis will combine their unique and proprietary Oligoclonics® and SUREtechnology™ platforms respectively to develop a product combining two bispecific full length IgG antibodies that simultaneously targets and potently inhibits three receptor tyrosine kinases. The lead Oligoclonics® candidate was discovered as part of a previous EUREKA program and will be produced from a single manufacturing cell line developed by Selexis.
Company News: Merus starts Phase I/II clinical trial for MCLA-128, an ADCC-enhanced bispecific antibody for solid tumors
– First patient dosed in trial with potent bispecific antibody overcoming resistance to HER2-targeted therapies –
Merus B.V., a leader in developing best-in-class bispecific antibody therapeutics to treat cancer patients, today announced the initiation of a phase I/II clinical study of MCLA-128 for the treatment of solid tumors. MCLA-128 is an ADCC-enhanced, full-length IgG bispecific antibody that simultaneously targets the growth factor receptors HER2 and HER3.
The trial is an open-label, European multi-center dose escalation study to assess the safety, tolerability and anti-tumor activity of MCLA-128. The first part of the study is designed as a dose escalation study, followed by a second part to further characterize the safety, tolerability and clinical efficacy of MCLA-128. Initially, the study will enroll 52 patients with advanced epithelial tumors. Primary endpoint is safety; secondary endpoints include, among others, the immunogenicity of MCLA-128 as well as anti-tumor response and clinical benefit.
Company News: ProBioGen and Merus Sign Deal on GlymaxX® ADCC Enhancement Technology
– GlymaxX® Manufacturing Technology Improves Bispecific Antibody Activity for Solid Tumor Treatment –
ProBioGen AG and Merus B.V. today announced that the companies have signed a non-exclusive commercial option and license agreement on ProBioGen’s GlymaxX® fucose-engineering technology. Under the terms of the agreement, ProBioGen is granting Merus the non-exclusive right to use the GlymaxX® technology to enhance the ADCC (Antibody-Dependent Cell-Mediated Cytotoxicity) activity of one of its lead products, a bispecific anti-cancer antibody. The license is covering clinical development and production. Financial details have not been disclosed.
The GlymaxX® technology for the production of afucosylated antibodies and proteins is based on the stable integration of a heterologous enzyme into any antibody producer cell line, leading to the interference with the cells’ intracellular fucose biosynthesis pathway. As a unique feature differentiating it from other approaches, the GlymaxX® technology can be applied to both novel and already existing antibody producer cell lines and entire antibody expression and discovery platforms without negatively affecting their productivity. Moreover, it is simple, rapid, potent and universally applicable.