GERMANY – BioNTech SE has signed a collaboration agreement with the Government of the United Kingdom to benefit cancer patients by accelerating clinical trials for personalized mRNA immunotherapies.
The strategic partnership aims to provide personalized cancer therapies for up to 10,000 patients by the end of 2030, either in clinical trials or as authorized treatments, according to a BioNTech note.
In an official statement, the Company said: “BioNTech will remain the local sponsor of current and upcoming new clinical trials of its programs in the UK and will design the clinical trial protocols.”
It is part of a multi-year collaboration focused on three strategic pillars namely cancer immunotherapies based on mRNA or other drug classes, infectious disease vaccines, and investments into expanding BioNTech’s footprint in the UK.
“The Company and the UK Government plan to accelerate trial site and patient recruitment for clinical candidates of BioNTech’s pipeline for personalized mRNA cancer immunotherapies and infectious disease vaccines,” announced BioNTech.
The next-generation immunotherapy company further said that to accelerate clinical trial recruitment, the parties plan to utilize the UK’s clinical trial network, genomics, and health data assets.
“The next steps of the collaboration will be the selection of candidates, trial sites, and the set-up of a development plan with the aim of being ready to enroll the first cancer patient in the second half of 2023,” said the German pharma giant.
BioNTech disclosed that it intends to design and roll out randomized trials in adjuvant or metastatic settings with registrational potential for the Company’s personalized mRNA cancer immunotherapies in the UK.
On his part, Prof. Ugur Sahin, M.D., Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of BioNTech said: “Our goal is to accelerate the development of immunotherapies and vaccines using technologies we have been researching for over 20 years.”
He expressed his belief that the collaboration has the potential to improve outcomes for patients and provide early access to the Company’s suite of cancer immunotherapies as well as to innovative vaccines against infectious diseases.
“This agreement is a result of the lessons learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic as we all experience that drug development can be accelerated without cutting corners if everyone works seamlessly together towards the same goal,” added Prof Sahin.
He reaffirmed to patients that the Company continues to evaluate various combinations of mRNA backbone and delivery technologies with the aim of identifying highly efficient candidates with a favourable safety profile.
Meanwhile, BioNTech plans to invest in a UK Research and Development (R&D) hub in Cambridge with an expected capacity of more than 70 highly skilled scientists, the first to commence R&D by the end of the first quarter of 2023.
It also intends to set up a regional headquarter in London to accommodate employees in global and regional supporting functions including Regulatory, Medical, Intellectual Property, and Legal.
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