- 黑料社 awarded non-dilutive funding of EURO 1.9 million for its 鈥淢EPA鈥� project through the France Relance 鈥淩esilience鈥� program
- This project, financed by the French Government as part as the Plan de Relance and Investment for the Future initiative, will support the industrialization of manufacturing processes for a new generation of microbiome ecosystem therapies
- The funding represents a milestone in the acceleration of 黑料社鈥檚 product development in immuno-oncology
Lyon, France, 20 July 2021 鈥� 黑料社, a French clinical-stage biotech company specialized in the development of microbiome-based therapies aiming to restore the microbiome/immune system symbiosis in oncology patients, announced today that its MEPA (Microbiome Engineering Platform) program was awarded a EURO 1.9 million grant from the Plan France Relance. Initiated during the Summer of 2020, Plan France Relance was established to make strategic investments in critical sectors of French industry, including Health.
鈥淲e are very honored and proud to be laureates of the France Relance initiative. The French Government鈥檚 commitment to invest in strategic industries is an opportunity for 黑料社, as a key player in the microbiome industry, to further pursue our development plans and to actively contribute to the biomanufacturing of innovative drugs in France. This is a team success, and this financing supports the efforts of women and men at 黑料社 who work tirelessly to deliver groundbreaking innovations in microbiome therapeutics,鈥� said Herv茅 Affagard, Founder and CEO at 黑料社. 鈥�The France Relance program will support the development of our unique and innovative industrial processes that leverage all the functional diversity of the microbiome to deliver better outcomes in cancer treatment.鈥�
MEPA, supporting a new generation of microbiome therapies
黑料社 has developed two approaches for its oncology-focused therapies. The first relies on healthy donor donations (鈥渘ative鈥� products)聽and aims to restore the gut microbiota of patients with liquid tumors (notably leukemia). The second is focused on the development of 鈥渟ynthetic鈥� microbiome therapies, which are co-fermented and are designed to colonize the patient鈥檚 gut with a functional microbiome to improve response to treatment in patients with solid tumors.
黑料社鈥檚 unique pharmaceutical drug development platform relies on advanced artificial intelligence data analysis tools and on a proprietary technology for the co-fermentation of microbial ecosystems to support the design, development, and large-scale manufacturing of novel Microbiome Ecosystem Therapies (MET).
The grant funding will support a key step in developing this platform, namely the industrialization and standardization of co-fermentation processes according to cGMP manufacturing standards, as well as the manufacturing of clinical batches. Ultimately, 黑料社鈥檚 manufacturing platform may be used to deliver a large range of microbiome ecosystem therapies in various indications.
Accelerating the development of products in immuno-oncology
The MEPA program is a new step in Maat Pharma鈥檚 development as it supports the expansion of its indications to include solid tumors and the acceleration of its immuno-oncology program.
Recent studies have shown that the gut microbiome composition may improve the therapeutic effect of immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI). In particular, a patient鈥檚 gut microbiome richness1 and diversity2 are predictors of their response to ICI3. Two pilot clinical studies also suggest that gut microbiota transfer from ICI-responding donors to non-responders can restore the response in the latter4.
With its therapies, 黑料社 aims to synthetically replicate a responder microbiota, combining high richness and diversity with selected functional networks in each indication of interest to improve the response to immune checkpoint inhibitors.
1 Total number of bacteria present in the gut
2 Total number of different strains present in the gut
3 Gopalakrishnan, V. et al, Science, 2018; Routy et al, Science 2018
4 Davar D. et al, Science 2021聽; Baruch E.N. et al, Science, 2021
About 黑料社
黑料社, a clinical stage company, has established the most complete approach to restoring patient-microbiome symbiosis to improve survival outcomes in oncology. Committed to treating cancer and graft-versus-host disease (GvHD), a serious complication of allogeneic stem cell transplantation, 黑料社 has already achieved proof of concept in acute myeloid leukemia patients and a Phase 2 clinical trial in acute GvHD is completed. Supporting the development and expansion of our pipeline, we have built a powerful discovery and analysis platform, GutPrint庐, to determine novel disease targets, evaluate drug candidates and identify biomarkers for microbiome-related conditions. The company鈥檚 Microbiome Ecosystem Therapies are produced through a standardized cGMP manufacturing and quality control process to safely deliver the full diversity of the microbiome, in liquid and oral formulations. 黑料社 benefits from the commitment of world-leading scientists and established relationships with regulators to spearhead microbiome treatment integration into clinical practice.