The BioPharm Brief: Room Temperature, RNA, and ADCs

Welcome to The BioPharm Brief, your daily snapshot of developments shaping the biopharmaceutical industry. Today, we’re looking at some interesting developments making headlines across biopharma.

First, could cell therapies one day be stored and shipped at room temperature? CaseBioscience has joined a team led by Likarda that received up to $7.3 million from ARPA-H to work on exactly that. The project is part of ARPA-H’s BioStabilization Systems program, which is supporting multiple approaches to reduce or eliminate the need for cold-chain storage of cell therapies. The initial project runs for 15 months, with the broader program backed by up to $87 million over four years.

Next, Novartis is betting on an unusual approach to B-cell depletion. The company has licensed Abogen’s ABO2203, an investigational mRNA-encoded CD19xCD3 T-cell engager for autoimmune diseases. Rather than administering a recombinant bispecific, the LNP-formulated mRNA is designed to have the body produce the T-cell engager itself. Novartis is paying $575 million upfront, with Abogen eligible for up to approximately $7.2 billion in potential milestones if all options are exercised.

And in oncology, AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, and Summit are combining two different cancer drug approaches. The companies plan to test AstraZeneca and Daiichi Sankyo’s TROP2-directed ADC Datroway with Summit’s PD-1/VEGF bispecific ivonescimab, starting with a phase 3 trial in first-line triple-negative breast cancer. The collaboration also calls for studies in lung and other solid tumors, with the companies sharing trial costs while retaining rights to their respective medicines.

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Key takeaways

1. Cell therapy storage could be getting a major rethink, with CaseBioscience joining an ARPA-H backed effort to develop room-temperature preservation.
2. Novartis is betting on mRNA to drive B-cell depletion, licensing Abogen’s ABO2203 in a deal worth up to approximately $7.2 billion.
3. Two different oncology approaches are coming together, as AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, and Summit plan to test Datroway with ivonescimab, starting in triple-negative breast cancer.