New biotechnology firm is born
PsiOxus Therapeutics will focus on developing novel treatments for cancer and wasting diseases
Myotec Therapeutics and Hybrid BioSystems have merged to form PsiOxus Therapeutics, a new biotechnology company using non-traditional approaches to novel therapeutics for cancer and wasting diseases.
The new company, with labs in Upper Heyford, Oxfordshire, will be led by chief executive John Beadle, previously a co-founder of PowderMed, which was sold to Pfizer in 2006.
The company boasts a combined pipeline of phase I and II clinical stage assets, which will be supported with financing of £3.6m (US$5.8m), led by Imperial Innovations and with participation from investors from the merged predecessor companies.
The finance will be used to progress PsiOxus’ lead candidate MT-102, a dual action Anabolic Catabolic Transforming Agent (ACTA), through phase l and phase II clinical development, and to develop new drug candidates derived from the PsiOxus platform.
The company has initiated a multinational, double blind, placebo controlled phase II clinical study, which will be reported in 2011.
PsiOxus is also developing ColoAd1, an oncolytic virus that uses the evolutionary principle of natural selection to generate a virus with anti-cancer properties. The initial indications for the phase I/II clinical studies with ColoAd1 will be in metastatic colorectal cancer and primary hepatic cellular carcinoma.
The PsiOxus research pipeline also includes the vaccine platform PolySTAR, which combines recombinant viral vectors with polymers to shield them from the immune system, and the adjuvant and immunotherapeutic platform PolyMAP, which combines polymers with synthetic adjuvants to significantly enhance the effectiveness of vaccines.
Michael Moore, chairman of PsiOxus, and former ceo of Piramed, said: ‘We have the clinical trials expertise among our scientific founders to develop promising new therapeutics to treat cancer and other serious diseases. We now look forward to advancing this product pipeline through the clinical stages ahead.’