Innovation community news – September
Published on 26 September 2024
Image: ©Tokamak Energy Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
News and announcements from Milton Park based companies:
- Tokamak Energy appoints first CTO
- Emergex secures patent for influenza vaccine
- Vertex helping to improve diversity in science
- Grey Wolf Therapeutics & Pathios Therapeutics awarded funding by Innovate UK
- Arctoris expands board and facilities
- Summit Therapeutics raises new capital
- Replimune progresses melanoma application
- Immunocore presents at ESMO congress
Tokamak Energy appoints first CTO
Tokamak Energy has appointed Itxaso Ariza as its first Chief Technology Officer to spearhead its new business division. Previously, Itxaso spent 19 years with Rolls-Royce, culminating in her role as Chief Engineer in the civil aerospace division.
Tokamak Energy’s CEO, Warrick Matthews, said: “Itxaso brings a huge amount of leadership talent and experience to develop our technology strategy and shape the partnerships we need, to deliver our mission of commercialising clean, secure and affordable fusion energy in the 2030s.”
Tokamak recently launched TE Magnetics, a new division focused on commercialising high-performance HTS magnets for various applications, including medical and scientific research.
Warrick Matthews continued: “Launching this new business division allows us to focus on our core mission of delivering clean, secure and affordable fusion energy, while supporting our strategy for rapid growth across complementary markets.”
Emergex secures patent for innovative influenza vaccine
Milton Park-based Emergex Vaccines has secured a patent for a novel influenza vaccine targeting NEG8. The vaccine is designed to elicit a robust T-cell response against all influenza A strains dating back to 1918. The vaccine candidate is undergoing clinical trials, with phase 1 studies potentially starting in 2025.
If successful, this vaccine could represent a significant breakthrough in influenza prevention.
Prof Thomas Rademacher, Co-Founder and CEO of Emergex Vaccines, said: “Our research into NEG8 has revealed exciting potential for a new approach to influenza vaccines.
“We believe that a vaccine composition including conserved NEG8-derived MHC class I peptides could provide protection against past, existing, and emerging human influenza viruses, as well as prevent zoonotic influenza viruses from establishing themselves in the human population and causing a pandemic.
“Emergex aims to leverage this NEG8 epitope-containing vaccine to generate a durable and broadly protective cellular immune response upon vaccination.”
Vertex helping to improve diversity in science
This summer, Vertex Pharmaceuticals welcomed 15 local students to its Learning Lab at Milton Park, offering them the opportunity to work on active projects alongside experienced professionals.
Since opening its purpose-built Learning Lab in 2021, the company has hosted over 60 paid interns, providing valuable hands-on experience for underrepresented categories of students.
David Altshuler, Executive Vice President, Global Research and Chief Scientific Officer at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, said: “Our STEAM education programs are not just about the facts students might learn or the experiments they might do. It’s about helping them connect with a teacher and introducing them to the scientists who work here. And I think that makes it real for them, that they could do it, too – and that’s hope. That’s opportunity.”
Grey Wolf Therapeutics & Pathios Therapeutics awarded funding by Innovate UK
The Innovate UK Cancer Therapeutics programme has awarded £12 million to 23 companies working on innovative cancer treatments.
Occupier Grey Wolf Therapeutics has received £498,557 for unveiling concealed tumour proteins for targeted immune therapy in colorectal cancer, whilst Park-based Pathios Therapeutics, part of the same drug development ecosystem, has been awarded £475,743 for developing new drugs that harness the immune system response to fight brain tumours, by inhibiting the GPR65 receptor.
Minister of Science, Patrick Vallance, said: “Supporting researchers through this funding is an integral part of our mission to tackle cancer through innovative treatments that could benefit patients of all ages and give innovative small businesses the support they need to scale-up the development of their groundbreaking ideas here, in the UK.”
Arctoris expands board and facilities
Park occupier Arctoris has acquired a major part of Eli Lilly’s San Diego laboratory. This acquisition will significantly expand Arctoris’s research facilities, allowing the company to conduct more experiments simultaneously and reduce drug development timelines.
The recent surge in computationally driven drug discovery initiatives within the pharmaceutical industry has fueled Arctoris’s expansion.
As a result of this growth spurt, the contract research organisation is putting together a new Executive Team, with Tom Fleming as the new CEO and Ian Shott as the new Chair of the Board.
Other members of the leadership team include Anthony Rowen-Brown as new CSO; new Chief Business Officer Kinga Bercsenyi; accountant Paul Custance as CTO; Sally Cullen as chief people officer and Poppy Roworth as COO (you may have seen Poppy’s Park People article last month!).
Summit Therapeutics raises new capital
Summit Therapeutics, a US and Milton Park-based biotech company, has raised $235 million in new funding. The company plans to use the funds to advance the development of its drug, ivonescimab, for various cancer treatments, including non-small cell lung cancer.
Summit Therapeutics presented its data on ivonescimab at the ESMO 2024 conference in Barcelona earlier this month.
Replimune progresses melanoma application
Milton Park occupier Replimune has received positive feedback from the FDA, regarding its plans to seek accelerated approval for RP1 as a treatment for anti-PD1 refractory melanoma.
Sushil Patelt, Replimune CEO, said: “This successful pre-BLA meeting confirmed that the accelerated approval path is available for RP1 in anti-PD1 failed melanoma.
“With the confirmatory IGNYTE-3 trial underway, we remain on track to submit the BLA in 2H 2024 and continue our preparations to bring RP1 to patients with advanced melanoma.”
Immunocore presents at ESMO congress
Immunocore, a biotech company developing treatments for cancer and infectious diseases with its UK HQ located on Park Drive, presented data on brenetafusp, a drug used to treat platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, at the ESMO congress earlier this month.
The company is also sharing data on a biomarker that may predict treatment response for its drugs brenetafusp and KIMMTRAK.
David Berman, Head of R&D at Immunocore, said: “While early, the promising efficacy data from chemotherapy plus brenetafusp led us to expand the combinations we are studying, including in earlier-line platinum-sensitive disease.”
