Inovio Pharmaceuticals Completes Acquisition of Needle-Free Injection Technology
May 02 2016 - 7:31AM
Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:INO) announced today it has
closed the transaction to acquire all of BioJect Medical
Technologies Inc.’s assets, including pioneering needle-free jet
injection technology, devices, and intellectual property, which it
first announced in a definitive agreement on March 14, 2016. Inovio
acquired BioJect for $4.3 million in Inovio common stock and $1.2
million in cash.
Inovio is advancing multiple novel cancer and
infectious disease immunotherapies and vaccines as well as delivery
devices to optimally administer them. Since administration of
Inovio’s products is a two-step process involving injection and
electroporation delivery, it is also focused on enhancing ease and
cost of administration to best serve clinical requirements. An
integrated injection and electroporation device that eliminates
needles and reduces disposable materials in an automated process
would be a paradigm-changing step in vaccine administration in
large populations.
Inovio has been developing needle-free
electroporation technology that works on the surface of the skin.
BioJect’s needle-free jet injection technology uses high pressure
gas or springs to propel liquid medicine into skin. Its devices
have demonstrated favorable utility, safety, and tolerability
attributes in animals and humans. Under a prior research agreement
Inovio tested the two separate technologies together and generated
compelling antigen expression and immune responses in animals.
Inovio will now be combining the two technologies into one highly
optimized integrated delivery device.
Dr. J. Joseph Kim, President and CEO, said,
“Inovio’s current electroporation devices are underpinning
important immunotherapy and vaccine products with clear clinical
development paths and commercial opportunities. Our CELLECTRA® 5PSP
device for intramuscular immunotherapy delivery, with its recently
finalized commercial design, will be used in our cervical dysplasia
phase III study for VGX-3100. Our intradermal delivery device,
which facilitated recently reported robust immune responses from
our Ebola vaccine, will be used to advance other infectious disease
vaccine clinical development programs including the one we are
preparing for Zika.
“As we think long-term about broad market needs
and new product opportunities, needle-free administration could
help make potentially life-changing vaccines against critical
infectious diseases more widely accessible globally. This newly
acquired needle-free injection technology is an excellent addition
in our product development vision and we look forward to fulfilling
our vision for this optimized, highly automated needle-free
delivery device.”
Supporting the goal of non-invasive
administration, the U.S. Army Small Business Innovation Research
program recently granted Inovio $500,000 to support the development
of a needle-free, non-invasive skin-surface electroporation device
for DNA vaccine delivery.
About Inovio Pharmaceuticals,
Inc.
Inovio is taking immunotherapy to the next level
in the fight against cancer and infectious diseases. We are the
only immunotherapy company that has reported generating T cells in
vivo in high quantity that are fully functional and whose killing
capacity correlates with relevant clinical outcomes with a
favorable safety profile. With an expanding portfolio of immune
therapies, the company is advancing a growing preclinical and
clinical stage product pipeline. Partners and collaborators include
MedImmune, Roche, The Wistar Institute, University of Pennsylvania,
DARPA, GeneOne Life Science, Drexel University, NIH, HIV Vaccines
Trial Network, National Cancer Institute, U.S. Military HIV
Research Program, and University of Manitoba. For more information,
visit www.inovio.com.
This press release contains certain
forward-looking statements relating to our business, including our
plans to develop electroporation-based drug and gene delivery
technologies and DNA vaccines, our expectations regarding our
research and development programs and our capital resources. Actual
events or results may differ from the expectations set forth herein
as a result of a number of factors, including uncertainties
inherent in pre-clinical studies, clinical trials and product
development programs (including, but not limited to, the fact that
pre-clinical and clinical results referenced in this release may
not be indicative of results achievable in other trials or for
other indications, that the studies or trials may not be successful
or achieve the results desired, including safety and efficacy for
VGX-3100 and INO-3112, that pre-clinical studies and clinical
trials may not commence or be completed in the time periods
anticipated, that results from one study may not necessarily be
reflected or supported by the results of other similar studies and
that results from an animal study may not be indicative of results
achievable in human studies), the availability of funding to
support continuing research and studies in an effort to prove
safety and efficacy of electroporation technology as a delivery
mechanism or develop viable DNA vaccines, our ability to support
our broad pipeline of SynCon® active immune therapy and vaccine
products, our ability to advance our portfolio of immune-oncology
products independently, the ability of our collaborators to attain
development and commercial milestones for products we license and
product sales that will enable us to receive future payments and
royalties, the adequacy of our capital resources, the availability
or potential availability of alternative therapies or treatments
for the conditions targeted by the company or its collaborators,
including alternatives that may be more efficacious or
cost-effective than any therapy or treatment that the company and
its collaborators hope to develop, our ability to enter into
partnerships in conjunction with our research and development
programs, evaluation of potential opportunities, issues involving
product liability, issues involving patents and whether they or
licenses to them will provide the company with meaningful
protection from others using the covered technologies, whether such
proprietary rights are enforceable or defensible or infringe or
allegedly infringe on rights of others or can withstand claims of
invalidity and whether the company can finance or devote other
significant resources that may be necessary to prosecute, protect
or defend them, the level of corporate expenditures, assessments of
the company's technology by potential corporate or other partners
or collaborators, capital market conditions, the impact of
government healthcare proposals and other factors set forth in our
Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2015,
and other regulatory filings from time to time. There can be no
assurance that any product in Inovio's pipeline will be
successfully developed or manufactured, that final results of
clinical studies will be supportive of regulatory approvals
required to market licensed products, or that any of the
forward-looking information provided herein will be proven
accurate.
CONTACTS:
Investors: Bernie Hertel, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, 858-410-3101, bhertel@inovio.com
Media: Jeff Richardson, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, 267-440-4211, jrichardson@inovio.com
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