VacV Biotheraputics (UK) Ltd

PRESS RELEASE VacV Biotherapeutics emerges from stealth mode to bring ground-breaking cancer immunotherapies to the clinic Enhanced systemic delivery system using novel Vaccinia virus technology targets a range of cancersBuilds on more than 20 years of pioneering research at Barts Cancer Institute, one of the top cancer research centers in the UKStrong pre-clinical validation with a lead asset poised to enter clinical development London, UK, 26 October 2022 – VacV Biotherapeutics (“VacV” or “the Company”), a cancer immunotherapy company developing innovative viral-based therapies, emerged from stealth mode today to advance its promising pipeline of pre-clinical assets with best-in-class potential, towards the clinic. VacV has spun out of Barts Cancer Institute and Queen Mary University of London following 20 years of pioneering research by immunotherapy experts Professor Yaohe Wang, Professor Nicholas Lemoine, and their team of internationally renowned cell and gene therapy researchers. The Company has already attracted a $3 million investment from Proxima Ventures, which it has used to complete preclinical studies and build the team. Immunotherapies, which enable a patient’s immune system to recognize and target cancer cells, have made a significant difference to cancer patients over the last decade. However, many patients fail to respond. Oncolytic viruses can directly kill cancer cells, alter the tumor microenvironment and sensitize more patients to immunotherapy. Glyn Edwards, Executive Chairman of VacV Biotherapeutics, commented: “VacV’s platform addresses many of the historic challenges faced by oncolytic viruses and builds on more than 20 years of research experience of its founders. We use a carefully engineered virus to destroy the tumor and activate anti-cancer immunity at the same time. As a pioneer in this space, VacV has generated viruses with optimal payloads and backbones to create a systemically deliverable, targeted, viral-based cancer immunotherapy.” Prof Yaohe Wang, Chief Scientific Officer of VacV Biotherapeutics, commented: “Our approach focuses on stimulating the patient’s immune system to fight cancer through the delivery of immune-modulating payloads as well as the virus’ oncolytic activity. This expertly designed Vaccinia virus-based therapy allows for easy, intravenous administration whilst overcoming challenges of existing approaches, such as cancer vaccines, immuno-check point blockade and CAR-T/TCR-T cells. We are excited to be developing this therapy for patients in an effort to improve outcomes and prevent the recurrence of the disease.” Using its technology platform, VacV has developed a promising pipeline of therapeutic candidates and is initially focusing on a range of refractory solid tumors including pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma, glioblastoma and metastatic colorectal cancer amongst others. VacV’s work has been supported by the Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult (CGTC). -Ends- For more information please contact: VacV Biotherapeutics (UK) LtdGlyn Edwards, Executive Chairman info@vacvbtx.com Consilium Strategic Communications Mary-Jane Elliott / Ashley Tapp / Stella Lempidaki VacV@consilium-comms.comTel: +44 (0) 20 3709 5700 About VacV Biotherapeutics VacV Biotherapeutics is a cancer immunotherapy company developing innovative viral-based therapies for cancers. Launched in 2022 by cancer immunotherapy pioneers Professor Yaohe Wang, Professor Nicholas Lemoine, Dr. Louisa Chard Dunmall and Dr. Peng Liu, VacV employs a unique approach to immunotherapy based on the Vaccinia virus to stimulate a patient’s immune system to fight cancer while simultaneously destroying cancer cells. This approach offers many advantages over existing immunotherapies, including minimized toxicity, higher specificity and efficacy, allowing for efficient systemic delivery of an immunotherapy for the first time. Find out more online at: http://vacvbtx.com/ Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn About Queen Mary Innovation Ltd Queen Mary Innovation Ltd (QMI) is Queen Mary University of London’s wholly-owned technology transfer company and is responsible for the commercialization and management of the university’s intellectual property and a portfolio of spinout companies. These include Keratify, a patented technology designed by skin scientists to improve current skin testing practices; Nemisindo, a technology created by Queen Mary’s Entrepreneur in Residence Professor Josh Reiss, which generates sounds using physics models, for use instead of samples; Dragonfly, an automatic saliency detection company (with revenues growing rapidly at more than £1m per annum); and hViVo, the world leader in testing infectious and respiratory disease products using human challenge study models, which developed the world's first COVID-19 challenge study model. Find out more online at: https://www.qmul.ac.uk/

Oncolytic viruses — viruses that can selectively replicate in cancer cells and kill them — have been steadily attracting investment and curiosity. However, for the most part, those candidates have not quite panned out to the extent their backers hope. But now, one new biotech claims it can actually meet that bar. VacV Biotherapeutics emerged from stealth in the UK early Wednesday morning, helmed by chief founder and CSO Yaohe Wang and enlisting Glyn Edwards — the former head at C. difficile biotech Summit Therapeutics before Bob Duggan took over in 2020 — as executive chairman. Edwards tells Endpoints News that he got involved earlier this year, back in June, as Wang was looking to set up a company. ” I got involved through a mutual friend who called and said, ‘these guys are trying to spin a company out,'” Edwards said. The chairman added that with his background as a former CEO, he didn’t want to become a CEO again — adding that he’s “happy to be be chair and to coach these guys. And so I helped them get the seed money, work out how we should organize and do the boring admin things, like sorting out finance accounts, payroll, while they’re playing tunes with these viruses.” As to how the biotech sets itself apart from other oncolytic virus biotechs, Edwards said that the biotech has made certain modifications to its virus backbone that allows the virus to essentially “coat” itself with the patient’s own proteins, allowing for systemic delivery and not having to be delivered right at the tumor site. Another modification is to a gene called N1L — and according to the chairman, that modification allows for reduced neurotoxicity of the native virus and simultaneously boost patient immune response to the tumor. Edwards says another way VacV seeks to set itself apart is that its oncolytic viruses could overcome one of the major issues seen in other candidates: lack of potency. “They [candidates] look really good in animal models. And then when they get into man, they’ve been relatively stable — they’ve been one or two exceptions to that, that have seen safety problems. But generally, the thing that’s held them back has been this lack of efficacy,” the chairman added. He went on to describe how there’s a bit of a balancing act that needs to be achieved to hone an oncolytic virus to perform well — on one hand, a virus needs to be modified to not infect healthy cells and only infect tumor cells. However, if a virus is modified too much, its infectivity gets worse. On the other hand, potency becomes a balancing act as well. Per Edwards, initial efforts in other companies were looking at multiple cytokines as payloads to these oncolytic viruses, or only have one cytokine that is extra potent. However, if a payload was too strong, it made the immune system’s response a little overboard, leading to safety issues. “So the state of the art now is to have a virus that is attenuated, but not too much, so that it retains its ability to multiply and infect the tumor cells — and to have the appropriate payload that can go in there, that’s strong enough to invoke the the patient’s immune response, but not so strong that you get this cytokine storm,” Edwards noted. At least in the US, only one oncolytic virus has made it past the FDA: Amgen’s Imlygic for certain types of melanoma. So far, the biotech has announced a seed financing round of $3 million from Proxima Ventures. And once some other things get underway, it’s off to recruiting for a Series A. “And like all biotech companies, who either admit that they’re raising money — or they’re lying — once we’ve got through this launch activity, we will be looking to put together a Series A of international investors,” Edwards added. What’s next for VacV? Amid hiring plans, the biotech says it is two years away from the clinic, but it has almost nothing to do with candidate development — Edwards said that the top two candidates, being looked at in pancreatic cancer and glioblastoma, are basically ready to go. What the biotech needs, said the chairman, is to get settled in as its own company. Setting up manufacturing, moving the company out of the cancer institute it is currently located out and into its own facilities, and hiring more people to help run planned clinical trials. There are a few companies that have been looking at oncolytic viruses as well. The team over at Replimune just recently took on a $200 million loan to be given out over the next five years, and while it saw progress earlier this year on its lead candidate, questions initially lingered on the effectiveness of its back-up candidate.