Compugen Ltd. (NASDAQ: CGEN),
a leading predictive drug discovery company, will disclose an additional
novel immune checkpoint target candidate, CGEN-15029, and initial
experimental validation data for this candidate at its Analyst and
Investor Day in New York City today. In addition, the Company will
disclose a new computational infrastructure, LINKS, which is designed
for the comprehensive and comparative assessment of drug targets.
Initial usage of this new infrastructure resulted in the selection of
five target candidates, including CGEN-15029, as the highest priority
immune checkpoint target programs to be advanced by the Company.
A live webcast of the Analyst and Investor Day event will be available
on the investor section of Compugen’s
website beginning at 9:00 a.m. ET today. An archived replay of the
webcast will be available on the website for 30 days after the event.
Dr. Cohen-Dayag, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of
Compugen, stated, “We are very excited to disclose the initial
validation of this additional novel immune checkpoint candidate, along
with identification of its binding partner. These initial biological
studies provide a better understanding of the mechanism of action of
this candidate and should support a clear path to therapeutic antibody
discovery and development.”
Dr. Cohen-Dayag continued, “In addition, the recent development and
application of our LINKS infrastructure provided new insights into the
therapeutic potential of our novel target candidates and further
enhanced our capabilities. Establishing our unique target discovery
capabilities required many years of pioneering multi-disciplinary
research, however, once established, the in silico discovery of
multiple B7/CD28-like immune checkpoint candidates took only several
months. We believe that further validation and clinical advancement of
the multiple target candidates resulting from the initial usage of our
discovery infrastructure will continue to demonstrate a level of
predictive accuracy that is unprecedented in pharmaceutical research in
terms of the quality and quantity of the candidates.”
CGEN-15029 is one of eleven novel B7/CD28-like immune checkpoint
candidates discovered by Compugen. Initial validation studies show that
expression of CGEN-15029 in T-cells inhibits their activation by
melanoma cells, consistent with an immune suppressive role of the target
in the tumor microenvironment. The target possesses signature
immune-checkpoint receptor characteristics, including expression in
relevant subsets of T- and NK-cells, with particularly high expression
in lymphocytes that populate the tumor microenvironment (known as tumor
infiltrating lymphocytes or TILs). A binding partner for CGEN-15029 has
also been identified, which enables a clear path towards selection of
inhibitory antibodies and their therapeutic development.
The LINKS infrastructure is a novel, proprietary, in silico
platform designed to allow comprehensive characterization and
differentiation of drug target candidates. LINKS was designed to
integrate and analyze extremely large amounts of patients’ disease and
clinical data to associate novel drug targets with specific disease
conditions, clinical attributes and disease-associated mechanisms of
action. During the past several months, this new infrastructure was
applied to analyze Compugen’s pipeline of immune checkpoint target
candidates and to compare them to one another as well as to
differentiate them from known immune checkpoints. This analysis included
immune subpopulations, regulatory mechanisms and cancer-specific immune
signatures, and enabled Compugen to compare and differentiate its large
portfolio of novel immune checkpoint programs, other than the two that
are subject to a collaboration agreement with a pharma partner. Based on
this assessment, as well as experimental data for the target candidates,
Compugen selected five target programs as highest priority, including
CGEN-15029, representing various aspects of cellular immune biology and
therefore potentially addressing multiple therapeutic applications and
indications.
About Immune Checkpoints
Immune checkpoints are inhibitory
receptors and their ligands, which are crucial for the maintenance of
self-tolerance (that is, the prevention of autoimmunity) and for the
protection of tissues from damage when the immune system is responding
to pathogenic infection or other injuries. These immune checkpoints,
which are "hijacked" by tumors to block the ability of the immune system
to destroy the tumor (immune resistance), have emerged as promising
targets for cancer immunotherapy, and have shifted the treatment
paradigms for several major cancer types. Therapeutic blockade of immune
checkpoints boost anti-tumor immunity, enabling the patient’s immune
system to recognize and attack the tumor cells, and mount durable
anti-tumor responses and tumor destruction. Although to date the
blockade of immune checkpoints has proven effective for only a minority
of patients in a limited, but growing number of cancer types, it has
provided impressive clinical benefits, enabling long-term survival, even
for end-stage patients, and is transforming cancer therapeutics.
About Compugen
Compugen is a leading predictive drug
discovery company focused on monoclonal antibodies and therapeutic
proteins to address important unmet needs in the fields of oncology and
immunology. The Company utilizes a broad and continuously growing
integrated infrastructure of proprietary scientific understandings and
predictive platforms, algorithms, machine learning systems and other
computational biology capabilities for the in silico (by
computer) prediction and selection of novel drug target candidates,
which are then advanced in its Pipeline Program. The discovery and
development of monoclonal antibody therapeutic candidates against
selected Compugen-discovered novel target candidates is performed by
Compugen’s wholly-owned US subsidiary located in South San Francisco.
The Company's business model includes collaborations covering the
further development and commercialization of product candidates at
various stages from its Pipeline Program and various forms of research
and discovery agreements, in both cases providing Compugen with
potential milestone payments and royalties on product sales or other
forms of revenue sharing. For additional information, please visit
Compugen's corporate website at www.cgen.com.
Forward Looking Statement
This press release contains
“forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking
statements can be identified by the use of terminology such as “will,”
“may,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “believes,” and “intends,” and describe
opinions about future events. These forward-looking statements involve
known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause the actual
results, performance or achievements of Compugen to be materially
different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed
or implied by such forward-looking statements. Some of these risks
include: that Compugen’s business model is substantially dependent on
entering into collaboration agreements with third parties and may not be
successful in generating revenues and that the development and
commercialization of therapeutic products includes many inherent risks,
including failure to receive regulatory approval. These and other
factors are more fully discussed in the "Risk Factors" section of
Compugen’s most recent Annual Report on Form 20-F as filed with the
Securities and Exchange Commission as well as other documents that may
be subsequently filed by Compugen from time to time with the Securities
and Exchange Commission. In addition, any forward-looking statements
represent Compugen’s views only as of the date of this release and
should not be relied upon as representing its views as of any subsequent
date. Compugen does not assume any obligation to update any
forward-looking statements unless required by law.
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