ImaginAb Announces Licensing Deal with AstraZeneca for CD8 ImmunoPET Technology

LOS ANGELES, March 30, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- ImaginAb Inc., a leading clinical stage immuno-oncology imaging company, today announced it has signed a multi-year non-exclusive license agreement with AstraZeneca.

Under the terms of the agreement, ImaginAb's CD8 ImmunoPET technology will be used in AstraZeneca's clinical trials in North America and Europe to facilitate clinical development of AstraZeneca's novel immunotherapies and to advance the clinical utility of ImaginAb's CD8 ImmunoPET. 

The deal is an opportunity for ImaginAb to support AstraZeneca's project teams on imaging CD8 cells in patients and both teams will be committed to analysing and interpreting the data for their respective research and development activities. 

ImaginAb will receive license fees and other contingent payments.

This agreement follows the recently signed pre-competitive alliance between AstraZeneca, ImaginAb and other global pharmaceutical companies, announced on October 14, 2019.  

Commenting on the news, Ian Wilson, Chief Executive Officer of ImaginAb said: "We are very pleased that AstraZeneca is expanding our relationship. Under the new agreement, ImaginAb will provide AstraZeneca with clinical doses of ImaginAb's CD8 ImmunoPET minibody, as well as technical support, to AstraZeneca clinical trials involving novel immunotherapies. ImaginAb's CD8 ImmunoPET technology is the clinically most advanced CD8 PET tracer. It is a powerful diagnostic approach for measuring non-invasively the effect of immunotherapies, which we believe will ultimately be used to predict therapeutic efficacy." 

About ImaginAb

ImaginAb Inc. is an immuno-oncology imaging company focused on providing actionable insight into patient selection and treatment progress for cancer immunotherapy, enabling precision medicine. ImaginAb engineers antibody fragments called minibodies that maintain the exquisite specificity of full-length antibodies while remaining biologically inert in the body. Used with widely available PET scan technology, these novel minibodies illuminate high-value molecular targets, providing physicians with a whole-body picture of immune activity. ImaginAb is advancing a pipeline of minibodies against oncology and immunology targets including the CD8 ImmunoPET targeting CD8 T cells.  ImaginAb's products have the potential to improve patient care and lower healthcare costs. The Company is backed by top tier venture capital firms and strategic corporate firms including The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, Nextech Invest, Adage Capital, The Cycad Group, Merck (MSD) Pharma, Novartis Bioventures and Jim Pallotta of the Raptor Group.

For more information about ImaginAb's pipeline and technology, visit www.imaginab.com.

About CD8 ImmunoPET

CD8 ImmunoPET minibody [89Zr-Df-IAB22M2C] binds CD8 receptor on human T cells and is used for non-invasive PET imaging of CD8 T cells in patients. These CD8 T cells are the main effector cells involved in the immune response against tumor cells. Thanks to the Zr-89 labelling of the minibody it can be visualized by PET imaging. The Phase 1 dose escalation study conducted with cancer patients receiving immunotherapy treatments has demonstrated safety, established the effective dose and the optimal PET imaging protocol as well as demonstrated proof of concept for using CD8 ImmunoPET as a clinical tool for the detection and imaging CD8 T cells in patients. Additional studies including ImaginAb's Phase 2 study and studies sponsored by ImaginAb's corporate partners are further establishing the repeat dosing and the utility of CD8 ImmunoPET as pharmacodynamic and predictive marker for immunotherapy.

For further information please contact:

ImaginAb
Ian Wilson
Email: info@imaginab.com  
Phone: +1-310-645-1211

Optimum Strategic Communications
Mary Clark, Supriya Mathur
Email: imaginab@optimumcomms.com  
Phone: +44-20-3950-9144