Research Agreement to Promote Development of Monoclonal Antibody-based Therapeutics

A consortium of biotech companies will promote the use of modified recombinant antibodies for use in the development of monoclonal antibody-based therapeutics to fight cancer and other life-threatening and debilitating diseases.

The cooperating companies include BioWa, Inc. (La Jolla, CA, USA), Lonza (Basel, Switzerland) and Pfizer Inc. (New York, NY, USA).

This arrangement will permit the use of the POTELLIGENT CHOK1SV cell line for research and development leading to production of multiple proprietary antibodies for Pfizer’s product pipeline. POTELLIGENT CHOK1SV is a host cell line for manufacturing recombinant antibodies that combines the power of BioWa’s engineered glycosylation POTELLIGENT Technology with the advantages of Lonza’s industry leading GS Gene Expression System that is based on Lonza’s preeminent host cell line, CHOK1SV.

POTELLIGENT Technology, which was developed by BioWa's mother company Kyowa Hakko Kirin (Tokyo, Japan), involves the reduction of the amount of fucose in the carbohydrate structure of an antibody using a proprietary fucosyl transferase-knockout CHO cell line as a production cell.

The POTELLIGENT CHOK1SV cell line retains the desirable features of a high-producing cell line (robust, high yielding, scalable), with the advantage of being a proven bioprocess platform. Antibodies produced by this cell line exhibit enhanced antibody dependent cellular cytotoxicity (ADCC) and can exert potent cytotoxic effects even when their target antigen is low. In addition, they work in whole blood and retain all other desirable features of common antibodies.

“We are pleased that the core value of POTELLIGENT Technology has been recognized by a global pharmaceutical company such as Pfizer, and are excited to work together with Pfizer on their innovative antibody research pipelines,” said Dr. Yasunori Yamaguchi, president and CEO of BioWa.

“The GS System and the CHOK1SV cell line continue to be a gold standard for therapeutic antibody development. We are proud to be able to support Pfizer with this technology for their ongoing development portfolio.” said Karen Fallen, head of licensing at Lonza.

Related Links:
BioWa, Inc.
Lonza
Pfizer Inc.