Funding
UCL spin-out BioVex Inc has raised $40 million to fund the Phase III trial of its melanoma cancer vaccine, and is working to raise a further $20 million to prepare to file for FDA approval in 2010.
The company was spun out of UCL in 1999 by its chief technology officer Robert Coffin, but moved its headquarters to the US in 2005 to try and access the capital markets there. It failed to get enough interest for an initial public offering in 2006, and this latest private funding is the sixth round from investors who have patiently supported the company over the past decade. The company’s R&D remains at the former headquarters in Abingdon, UK.
The money is to pay for a 360 patient trial of the BioVex’s cancer vaccine, OncoVex GM-CSF, in treating melanoma. The vaccine has a dual mode of action, directly killing tumours into which it is injected and then prompting the immune system to kill tumour deposits elsewhere.
OncoVex GM-CSF is based on a herpes simplex virus with a single gene deletion that renders the virus harmless to normal cells, whilst still being able to replicate in, and kill, cancer cells. The gene for granulocyte macrophage colony-stimulating factor carried by the virus then triggers the immune system to destroy metastases.
In the 50 patient Phase II trial, which reported in June 2008, OncoVex was shown to directly kill cancer cells in injected tumours and to initiate a systemic immune response that killed remote tumours.
Not only have BioVex’s private investors supported the company for ten years, they have kept faith with the technology, despite the failure of other cancer vaccines in development. The latest round was led by ABN AMRO Forbion Capital Partners. The other investors are Avalon Ventures; Credit Agricole Private Equity; GeneChem Management; Harris & Harris Group; Innoven Partenaires; Lloyds TSB Development Capital; New Science Ventures; Scottish Equity Partners; Omega Partners; and Triathlon Medical Ventures.
BioVex says that given the clinical data generated to date, coupled with the mild side effects, OncoVex GM-CSF has the potential to become a leading treatment for many solid tumours. Investors will be cheered by the thought that as yet the company has no partnership deals and has retained 100 per cent ownership of its products.
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