H3 Biomedicine Inc., a biopharmaceutical company specializing in the discovery and development of precision oncology treatments, and Selvita (PL: SLV), the largest drug discovery company in Central and Eastern Europe, announced today that they have extended their strategic collaboration to develop breakthrough precision medicines for cancers through September 2016. As part of the original collaboration begun in September 2013, the companies are validating the druggability of two kinase targets in a specific genetic context and have generated multiple novel chemical series against these targets.
The companies are seeking to make further progress towards the initiation of IND enabling studies during 2016. The results from both programs will be presented at scientific conferences in the first half of 2016.
“We are pleased to announce the extension of our collaboration with Selvita. Together we have continued to validate targets within a specific genomic context, which is at the core of H3's vision and mission,” said Markus Warmuth, president and chief executive officer of H3 Biomedicine. “The strength of the combined teams has allowed for rapid advancement of the biology and chemistry in parallel. We look forward to further advancing the programs from discovery to translation over the next year.”
“We are delighted to continue our collaboration with H3. Since the start of our collaboration, our teams have worked very well together, complementing each other’s efforts, said Pawel Przewiezlikowski, chief executive officer of Selvita. The results of both programs have been very promising and we look forward to seeing our jointly discovered molecules progressing through further studies.”
The agreement calls for H3 Biomedicine to provide additional research funding to Selvita, in addition to milestones and royalties on both programs. The financial terms of the agreement are confidential.
About H3 Biomedicine Inc.
H3 Biomedicine is a Cambridge, Massachusetts based biopharmaceutical company specializing in the discovery and development of precision oncology treatments. Leveraging an unprecedented collaboration with Eisai, which provides research funding and access to the capabilities and resources of a global pharmaceutical company, H3 Biomedicine combines long-term vision with operational independence. Using modern synthetic chemistry, chemical biology and human genetics, the company seeks to bring the next generation of cancer treatments to market with the goal of improving the lives of patients.
About Selvita
Selvita is a Polish biotechnology company engaged in the discovery and development of breakthrough medicines to treat oncology disorders, as well as provision of drug discovery services. It was established in 2007 and currently employs 275 people, including 86 PhDs. Selvita has currently several internal projects at early or late discovery stage and is expected to move its first candidates to the clinic in 2016. The most advanced programs at Selvita are SEL24, a pre-clinical PIM/FLT3 kinase inhibitor, with multiple indications in hematopoietic tumors and SEL120, first-in-class small molecule inhibitor of cyclin dependent kinase CDK8. Drug discovery clients of Selvita include more than fifty large and medium-sized pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies from USA and Europe. Selvita is listed on the NewConnect market of the Warsaw Stock Exchange in Poland (SLV).
