ActiTrexx secures financing: New transplant rejection therapy : Date:
ActiTrexx GmbH has closed a Series A funding round, during which it raised €3.5 million. The recently funded biotech company based in the Germany city of Mainz develops a cell therapy against transplant rejections. Clinical trials are due to start as early as this year.
ActiTrexx develops the product candidate ATreg, activated regulatory T cells (Tregs), which are stimulated by means of a proprietary process, to prevent rejection reactions in transplanted patients and excessive immune responses in autoimmune diseases. For this purpose, the regulatory T cells, as natural guardian cells of the immune system, are activated outside the body using a patented method and administered to patients intravenously. The team led by Professor Andrea Tüttenberg and Dr Helmut Jonuleit from the Department of Dermatology at the University Medical Center Mainz intends to use the funds raised to further optimize and clinically test the novel cell therapy.
The first clinical trials for the treatment of leukaemia patients who have undergone stem cell transplantation and are at a particularly high risk of developing the graft-versus-host disease (GvHD), a life-threatening transplant rejection, are due to start as early as this year. The clinical trials will be conducted in cooperation with the Department of Internal Medicine III at the University Medical Center Mainz. Preclinical data have shown that ATreg can significantly attenuate pre-existing GvHD and even largely prevent the development of the disease when given early after transplantation as a prophylactic treatment.
If these observations can be confirmed in patients in the clinic, ATreg may be the cornerstone of a new, effective GvHD therapy with few side effects.
Professor Tüttenberg, CEO of ActiTrexx, explained: “In the past, regulatory T cells have been successfully used in academic studies for GvHD therapy. However, the approach we are using represents a significant improvement over previously existing protocols due to the unique activation of Tregs. The ATreg product shortens the manufacturing process for Treg-based cell therapies from weeks to hours. The cell preparation can therefore be used within a very short time. This is of particular benefit to patients with acute GvHD who urgently need therapy.”
ActiTrexx is receiving funding under the “Gründungsoffensive Biotechnologie GO-Bio” (Founding Initiative Biotechnology) of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) for the development of cell therapeutics and drugs.