NEW YORK – NeoPhore on Tuesday said that it has signed a collaboration agreement with the Institute of Cancer Research, London, to further study its small molecule inhibitors of DNA mismatch repair (MMR) in genetically defined tumors.
NeoPhore is developing a pipeline of cancer drugs that target novel proteins in the MMR pathway, and has developed MMR modulators designed to induce neoantigen expression and make solid tumors more sensitive to immunotherapy.
Earlier this year, Cambridge, UK-based NeoPhore raised £21.5 million ($28.5 million) in a Series B funding round, including a £6 million financing extension. NeoPhore is using the funds to advance its MMR-focused drug pipeline from preclinical phase to investigational new drug application-enabling studies by 2024.
Through the collaboration with the ICR, NeoPhore is hoping to explore new mechanisms of action within the MMR pathway in a variety of solid tumors and expand the use of MMR inhibitors beyond neoantigen generation. The collaboration will bring in the expertise of Chris Lord, a professor of cancer genomics and the deputy head of the division of breast cancer research at the institute.
"Identifying new ways of treating cancer is central to much of what we do here at the ICR, and this project [with NeoPhore] will focus on exactly that," Lord said in a statement. "Our hope is that by working with NeoPhore, we can find new vulnerabilities in cancer cells that can be targeted by drugs that NeoPhore has discovered."
Since 2017, NeoPhore has signed multiple drug research collaborations, including with the University of Turin, St George's University of London, and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.