SOTIO Biotech, a clinical stage immuno-oncology company owned by PPF Group, today announced that is has exercised its first of five exclusive, target-specific options with LegoChem Biosciences (LCB, KOSDAQ: 141080) for antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) SOT106, which is currently being evaluated in preclinical studies across a multitude of solid tumor indications.
In November of 2021, SOTIO and LCB entered into a multi-target exclusive collaboration and license agreement under which SOTIO obtained the rights to deploy LCB’s ADC technology for up to five ADC programs. SOTIO is responsible for the research, development, manufacturing and worldwide commercialization of the ADC products.
“We are pleased with the progress we have made this year on our innovative antibody-drug conjugate pipeline. We advanced our lead program targeting CLDN18.2, SOT102 into the Phase 1 dose escalation portion of the CLAUDIO-01 trial and have now exercised this option for SOT106. ADCs remain one of the most actively pursued drug classes in oncology and we are encouraged that SOT106, an ADC with the potential to treat some of the most challenging solid tumor indications, continues to show promise in preclinical studies,” said Radek Spisek, M.D., Ph.D., chief executive officer of SOTIO. “The rapid and successful development of this collaboration with LegoChem Biosciences reiterates our commitment to providing patients with efficacious and safe cancer therapeutic options.”
“We are very excited that a successful outcome has been achieved in such a short time since the partnership launched a year ago.” said Dr. Yong-Zu Kim, the CEO & President of LCB. "This result has come from a combination of SOTIO’s deep antibody discovery expertise and LegoChem’s industry-leading and differentiated ADC platform technology. We look forward to further achieving progress in our efficient and close partnership as this effort continues into generating new drug candidates.”
The exercise of the first option triggers an undisclosed milestone payment by SOTIO to LCB.