Transgene and BioInvent announce clinical trial collaboration and supply agreement with MSD to evaluate BT-001 in combination with KEYTRUDA®

Strasbourg, France, and Lund, Sweden, June 28, 2022, 8:00 am CEST – Transgene (Euronext Paris: TNG), a biotech company that designs and develops virus-based immunotherapeutics against cancer, and BioInvent International AB (“BioInvent”) (Nasdaq Stockholm: BINV), a biotech company focused on the discovery and development of novel and first-in-class immuno-modulatory antibodies for cancer immunotherapy, today announced a clinical trial collaboration and supply agreement with MSD, a tradename of Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ., USA, to evaluate the oncolytic virus BT-001 in combination with MSD’s anti-PD-1 therapy KEYTRUDA® (pembrolizumab) in a Phase I/IIa clinical trial for the treatment of patients with solid tumors.

Under the terms of the supply agreement, MSD will provide pembrolizumab to be used in combination with BT-001 in the ongoing Phase I/IIa clinical trial.

“By combining BT-001 with the anti-PD-1 drug KEYTRUDA® we expect to optimize the patient’s immune response to induce a strong and effective anti-tumor response. This agreement will allow us to move further on the clinical development of our promising co-developed oncolytic candidate BT-001” said Hedi Ben Brahim, CEO of Transgene.

“We are very pleased to be signing another collaboration with MSD, supporting the expansion of the clinical trial program of BT-001, the oncolytic virus expressing our proprietary anti-CTLA-4 antibody, jointly developed by Transgene and BioInvent. It marks a further validation of our expanding and promising clinical pipeline of anti-cancer treatments, which currently encompasses three compounds in four ongoing clinical trials” added Martin Welschof, CEO of BioInvent.

Recruitment in the clinical study (NCT04725331) is ongoing. The trial is a Phase I/IIa of BT-001, which is being co-developed as part of a 50/50 collaboration between Transgene and BioInvent, as a single agent and in combination with KEYTRUDA® for the treatment of solid tumors.

KEYTRUDA® is a registered trademark of Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA.