NEW YORK – Lyell Immunopharma on Thursday said it will acquire ImmPact Bio to bring that firm's autologous CAR T-cell therapy candidate IMPT-314 into its pipeline.
In tandem with the acquisition, Lyell plans to discontinue several of its own pipeline candidates and redirect its resources toward developing IMPT-314 as a treatment for lymphoma.
Lyell will pay $30 million upfront, and 37.5 million shares of its common stock to acquire ImmPact. Additionally, ImmPact shareholders will be eligible to receive single-digit royalty payments, as well as an additional 12.5 million shares of Lyell's common stock, contingent on ImmPact hitting certain clinical milestones for IMPT-314 and getting it to market.
The transaction is expected to close during the fourth quarter of 2024. After that, South San Francisco, California-based Lyell expects its cash balance will support operations into 2027.
With IMPT-314, an autologous CAR T-cell therapy targeting CD19 and CD20, ImmPact is hoping to develop a cell therapy with better persistence compared to existing CAR T-cell therapies. The treatment involves a manufacturing process in which immune cells harvested from patients are enriched for naïve and central memory phenotypes.
ImmPact has been evaluating IMPT-314 in a Phase I/II trial in patients with relapsed or refractory aggressive B-cell lymphoma, and Lyell said in a statement that it plans to present initial data from this trial at a medical meeting later this year. Then, in 2025, Lyell said it will launch a pivotal trial for IMPT-314 in the third-line lymphoma setting.
The cell therapy has already demonstrated encouraging early efficacy in a small trial sponsored by the University of California, Los Angeles. In that Phase I trial, 12 out of 13 patients responded to IMPT-314, and 10 of these patients experienced a complete response. The median progression-free survival was 50.1 months, and after a median follow-up of 32 months, the median overall survival was not yet reached. The treatment also had a favorable safety profile.
As Lyell pivots its focus on IMPT-314, it will stop developing its ROR1-targeted CAR T-cell therapy candidate LYL797, the tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte candidate LYL845, as well as earlier-stage TIL therapies in its pipeline. Lyell will, however, continue developing its next-generation ROR1-targeted CAR T-cell therapy LYL119 in advanced ovarian cancer patients. The firm plans to begin evaluating that therapy in a Phase I trial later this year or in early 2025.
Both Lyell and ImmPact's boards of directors have approved the acquisition. Goldman Sachs is Lyell's financial adviser in the deal, and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom is its legal adviser. Cooley is ImmPact's legal adviser in the deal.