PCI Biotech

US patent for the vaccine technology (fimaVacc) with a new important class of adjuvants

Oslo (Norway), 26 March 2020 – PCI Biotech (OSE: PCIB), a cancer focused biopharmaceutical company, today announces that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has informed the company that a new US patent will be granted early April 2020. The US patent covers the use of fimaVacc in combination with a new important class of vaccine adjuvants called toll like receptor agonists.

Toll like receptor agonists (TLR agonists) is a diverse class of molecules that can be used for enhancing immune responses to several types of vaccines. TLR agonists have similarities to molecules present in various types of infectious agents, like viruses and bacteria, and can act as adjuvants to alert the immune system of a possible infection, thereby activating the immune system. The combination of TLR agonists with PCI Biotech’s vaccine technology, fimaVacc, has been shown to be effective for enhancing cellular immune responses that are important for the effect both of therapeutic and prophylactic vaccines. The US patent to be granted in April 2020 gives broad coverage for the combination of TLR agonists with the fimaVacc technology.

TLR agonists represent a new important class of vaccine adjuvants that are being developed with many new vaccine candidates. This US patent is therefore important for PCI Biotech’s partnering efforts and it also provides intellectual property of importance for our ability to potentially generate an internal future vaccine pipeline, said Per Walday, CEO of PCI Biotech.

As part of PCI Biotech’s strategy for applying the PCI technology for therapeutic cancer vaccines, several global patent applications were filed in 2013 and 2014. Today’s announced US patent secure protection until 2035 and this patent application is still pending in Europe and key Asian markets.

About fimaVacc              
This novel vaccine technology applies a unique mode of action, triggered endosomal release of antigens, to enhance the cytotoxic effect essential for therapeutic cancer vaccines as well as for several types of vaccines against viral and parasitic infections. fimaVacc works in synergy with several other state-of-the-art vaccination technologies, and is especially effective in combination with some types of TLR agonists. The fimaVacc programme aims to enhance the cellular immune responses that are important for the therapeutic and prophylactic effect of vaccines, and the fimaVacc technology has proven excellent preclinical efficacy with protein- and peptide-based vaccines. The technology has shown particularly strong CD8 T-cell immune responses, which are important for therapeutic vaccination, as well as enhanced helper (CD4) T-cell and antibody responses.