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Syncona Ltd on Thursday noted a promising safety profile for a cancer therapy concocted by one investee, and separately announced the completion of an acquisition in the retinal gene therapy space.
Syncona said Achilles Therapeutics PLC will next week at an industry conference present clinical data evaluating its T-cell cancer therapy.
Updated phase I/IIa data is from eight patients, suffering with advanced non-small cell lung cancer and recurrent or metastatic melanoma, showed the safety and tolerability of the Achilles therapy compared favourably to standard tumour infiltrating lymphocytes. TILs are therapies designed to kill cancer cells.
‘The best clinical response was a partial response (ongoing at week 33) in a NSCLC patient that showed an investigator reported 57% total tumour reduction at week 24, with response ongoing at 33 weeks,’ Syncona said.
‘Stable disease was observed in five NSCLC patients at week 12, with two patients remaining stable beyond weeks 15 and 26.’
The London-based healthcare and life science investor also said it has completed the acquisition of Applied Genetic Technologies Corp. Syncona is paying $23.3 million upfront, $0.34 per Applied Genetic share.
It will also pay an additional $0.73 per share, up to $50.0 million, triggered by the achievement of milestones.
Applied Genetic is Syncona’s third retinal gene therapy company.
Achilles Therapeutics shares closed 6.3% higher at $2.02 in New York on Wednesday, while Applied Genetic rose 1.2% to $0.39. Achilles has a market capitalisation of $82.7 million and Applied Genetic $26.5 million.
Syncona shares rose 1.6% to 175.01 pence each in London on Thursday morning for a £1.17 billion market cap.
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