On final dash to the clinic, ArsenalBio hauls in $220M for 'modular' cell therapy approach
06 Sep 2022
Cell TherapyImmunotherapy
If ArsenalBio does it right, its first CAR-T candidate — a potential treatment for ovarian cancer — will be in the clinic later this year.
And a group of deep-pocketed investors are betting $220 million that it can.
South San Francisco-based ArsenalBio launched out of the gate in late 2019 amid a wave of activity forming around cell therapy 2.0, with promises of putting together an “arsenal” of technologies that can engineer cells more precisely, in order to strike the perfect balance on efficacy and safety.
Researchers in biotech, academia and Big Pharma are offering puzzle pieces to crack CAR-T for solid tumors. Will they ever snap together?
While the success of CAR-T in blood cancers has fueled dreams of doing the same in solid tumors — turning cells into cancer-killing missiles — researchers have come to realize that solid tumors present a lot more unique challenges, from the lack of “clean” targets to a tumor microenvironment that’s tough on T cells.
To tackle all these barriers, ArsenalBio says it combines three technologies: non-viral gene editing; synthetic biology, including logic gates and tunable T cell functions; and genetic screening for genetic payloads to be edited into the CAR-T cells.
In a recent interview with Cell & Gene, CEO Ken Drazan took the example of ArsenalBio’s lead program, AB-1015, to illustrate the process:
The development candidate, AB-1015, was derived from numerous component sequences, individually tested and combinatorically optimized. The distinct functions of this DNA template are orchestrated by a proprietary ‘integrated circuit’ designed at ArsenalBio.
“ArsenalBio is taking a very modular approach to solving the multiple limitations of cell therapies,” he added. Drazan left his post as president of Grail in 2018 to co-found Arsenal, initially garnering $85 million in funds.
Softbank Vision Fund 2 invested in the round alongside Bristol Myers Squibb, Byers Capital, Emerson Collective Investments, Green Sands, Hitachi Ventures and Sixth Street. Existing backers also returned, including the Parker Institute for Cancer ImmunotherapyCancer Immunotherapy, Westlake Village BioPartners, the University of California, San Francisco Foundation Investment Company, Euclidean Capital, Waycross Ventures and Kleiner Perkins.
“Advances in genome engineering technologies such as CRISPR-Cas enable us to perceive mechanisms and develop tools that address T-cell exhaustion and improve memory, retain stemness, and enable persistence,” said Valentin Barsan, an investor for SoftBank Investment Advisers and oncologist at Stanford.
Barsan is joining ArsenalBio’s board of directors.
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