Cancer therapy renaissance

Cancer in Australia was just under 150,000 new cases diagnosed, and just under 50,000 deaths from cancer — one in two Australian men and women will be diagnosed with cancer by age 85, making it the leading cause of death in Australia.

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The cancer drug market could be on the cusp of a timely renaissance as new therapies come to the forefront of treatment, with around 25,000 more people dying each year from cancer now than 30 years earlier.

The market for cancer therapeutics is expected to grow by 7 per cent by 2030. More sustainable treatments are increasingly becoming the centre stage for drug developers mainly due to population growth and aging, but concerningly also due to rapidly changing lifestyles and environmental causes.

Biotechnology company Prescient Therapeutics (ASX: PTX) CAR-T and targeted therapies seek to provide treatment for various cancers, including tumours, which have been developed in collaboration with cancer centres in the US and Australia.

Unsurprisingly the Prescient stock has come a long way since it raised its capital at 5.5 cents in 2020, currently trading 245 per cent higher with a market capitalization of just under $118 million

“Identifying targets on the surface of these tumour cells, and then being able to bind to these targets,” Prescient senior vice president of scientific affairs Dr Rebecca Lim said.

“This is where the ECLIPSE platform has yielded some valuable breakthroughs in target identification and creating unique binders to these novel targets – targets that until now have been hidden inside the cancer cells.”

“This is where the power of the OmniCAR platform comes to the fore.”

“OmniCAR enables novel TCR-like binders to be uniquely combined with Prescient’s binders to result in a multi-valent and controllable cell therapy capable of addressing a much broader array of blood cancer cells to get the best chance of optimal patient outcomes.”

Going from strength to strength

Prescient has recently teamed up with MD Anderson in Texas to provide a range of solutions by signing a strategic collaboration agreement with the largest cancer centre in the US to create best-in-class, adaptable CAR-T cell therapies to treat blood cancers.

CAR-T cells work by modifying patients on T-cells, adding new receptors to recognize cancer antigens, but safety issues remain with the treatment.

This is where OmniCAR comes in, providing much safer outcomes, and is being developed by Prescient to market the next generation of cancer therapies.

The agreement is designed to combine Prescient’s OmniCAR modular ‘plug and play’ CAR platform with an undisclosed, proprietary binder discovered by MD Anderson’s ECLIPSE (coevolution of Leukemia and Immunity Post Stem cell transplant) platform.

Meanwhile, Prescient is developing several therapies, including treatments for leukemia, glioblastoma, breast, ovarian, and gastric cancers, while also looking to enter the lucrative multiple inhibitor market with therapies currently in the final stages of development — other similar CAR-T cell treatments, such as Kymriah, are already slated to hit $1 billion for the year in revenue with immunotherapy treatments is forecasted to hit USD 37 billion by 2028.

While these treatments remain expensive, costing at times upwards of half-a-million dollars for an entire course of treatment, they can be highly effective.

Evidence suggests that CellPryme is a factor in improving patient outcomes, extending lives, and avoiding the side effects of traditional treatments by enhancing T-cell therapies that will increasingly help strengthen the effectiveness of the treatment and should increase the impact of combating various types of cancers.

Treatments

The collaboration has the potential to lead to significant breakthroughs, becoming increasingly lucrative for both parties involved — mainly by providing sources of revenue.

PTX-100 and PTX-200 are both inhibitor therapies, with PTX-200 being the one closest to market viability and primarily aimed at breast cancer, with safety checking underway against comparable approved drugs on the market.

Safety remains a central issue, but considering the safety profiles of similar drugs could mean the drugs could soon be approved for sale.

Financial Outlook

Prescient has been diluting shares, although the cash position remains relatively stable for the time being and should be able to weather any short-term capital needs.

Solvency issues aren’t at the forefront of concerns for the company, with a modest cash burn rate of around $3 million a year and regular positive trial updates flowing through to the market.

Regardless, risks remain to the stock if the trials do not proceed according to plans, which could affect outcomes.

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