Oncimmune Holdings (ONC ) has signed another contract with a top 10 global pharmaceutical company to profile biomarkers in chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuropathy (CIDP), a slowly developing rare neurological disorder that attacks the nerves in your body.
Under the terms of this commercial contract, Oncimmune will utilise its proprietary biomarker discovery platform, SeroTag™, to identify autoantibodies related to the neurological disorder.
SeroTag™ is the company’s proprietary biomarker discovery engine, which is leveraged by its ImmunoINSIGHTS services to both discover and validate novel biomarkers that can help stratify patients in multiple cancer indications as well as with different autoimmune diseases.
Specifically, ImmunoINSIGHTS will produce and validate CIDP specific antigens utilising the SeroTag™ platform to screen clinical samples from CIDP patients for related autoantibodies.
CIDP is a rare type of autoimmune disease which attacks the myelin sheaths, the fatty coverings intended to insulate and protect nerves. Often referred to as Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) in its acute phase, CIDP is a chronic disorder that is difficult to diagnose. CIDP can lead to permanent physical impairment if not treated in its earliest stages.
Commenting on the commercial contract by revenue, Dr Adam M Hill, CEO of Oncimmune said: “We are pleased to announce this contract with another leading pharmaceutical company, adding to the growing list of global partners, working with us in the rare disease space where there is a real clinical need and opportunity to make a significant impact.”
“This contract will make full use of the unique attributes of SeroTag™, and the competencies amongst our scientific colleagues, who are world leaders in autoimmune profiling,” he said.
Hill added: “As is typical with SeroTag™ contracts, there is potential for the initial discovery work in autoantibodies to progress to further research and support for therapeutic development, creating and refining CIPD-specific NavigAIDTM panels using additional data and markers to guide drug development and inform patient and disease stratification.”
Today’s announcement marks the latest in a string of new agreements secured this week. On Monday morning, the immunodiagnostics group announced that it had signed a commercial collaboration deal with a healthcare company owned by Google’s parent known as Alphabet.
Oncimmune said it will utilise its recently validated infectious disease panel of biomarkers to evaluate whether autoantibodies are associated with the development of “Long COVID”.
On Tuesday, Oncimmune also announced that it would be utilising the autoantibody services of its ImmunoINSIGHTS platform as part of a new partnership with Synexa Life Sciences BV.
This ‘go-to-market’ collaborative partnership is expected to allow for comprehensive characterisation of the B-cell immune response in disease and treatment indications.
On Monday, Oncimmune also informed investors that it expects its ImmunoINSIGHTS to become ‘a leading player’ in the autoantibody profiling segment of pharma services by FY23.
In its half-year results for period to 30 November 2021, the group, which highlighted a solid ImmunoINSIGHTS pipeline, said this growth will be supported by an “enviable list” of existing blue-chip customers, which includes “many of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies.”
Since launching the ImmunoINSIGHTS business back in 2020, the company has secured contracts with five of the top ten global pharma companies. This is expected to constitute around 70% of revenue for FY22. The Group added that most of these clients have multiple studies, with five separate programmes underway with the world’s leading oncology group.
The number of contracted clients has more than doubled from FY21 to 13, with three of these currently running multiple contracts each. The company said momentum has continued to accelerate post period, particularly in terms of number of orders and its forecast pipeline.
In particular, the company highlighted to investors that there is increasing visibility from project extensions as well as additional contracts in other areas for Oncimmune’s existing clients.
The company currently anticipates that by the end of FY22 approximately 70% of FY22 group revenues will have been earned from contracts with the top ten pharmaceutical companies.
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