NOVASEP And THERAVECTYS Enter Into A New License Agreement On DNA Flap Technology For GMP Manufacturing Of Lentiviral Vectors

This agreement supports the growing demand for lentivector-based gene therapies, immunotherapies and vaccines

Novasep, a leading supplier of services and technologies for the life sciences industry, and Theravectys, a discovery & clinical development biotech company, today announced the signing of a license agreement allowing Novasep to use Institut Pasteur’s DNA Flap Technology to produce GMP-grade lentiviral vectors for clinical use in all therapeutic applications including gene therapy, cell therapy, immunotherapy and vaccination, for any customer, worldwide. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Theravectys holds a license from the Institut Pasteur, covering the production of lentiviral vectors and their use for vaccination applications.

“The lentiviral vector DNA Flap Technology has a huge potential for a new generation of therapeutic vaccines and immunotherapies, including the recently approved CAR-T cell immunotherapies to treat cancer,” said Jean Bléhaut, President of Novasep’s Manufacturing Solutions Business Unit. “This license agreement enables Novasep to secure the right to produce such lentiviral vectors for our customers worldwide.” He added: “It is an important step of our RISE-2 strategy, aimed at doubling our profitability by 2022, following 2 major investments at our Seneffe, Belgium site: “Senrise-IV”, our recently inaugurated, commercial viral vector manufacturing plant and “Senefill”, our new commercial fill & finish facility, which will be commissioned in 2019.”

The DNA Flap technology is derived from the genome of a lentivirus – and consists of a DNA sequence, including the cPPT and CTS cis-active sequences, that actively enables the import of any gene into a cell nucleus. Lentiviral vectors are thus employed to deliver genes of therapeutic interest to non-replicating cells, hence their efficacy in gene therapy and in T-cell engineering (CAR-T).

With more than 300 drugs under development, around 200 drugs in clinical trials, and 2 recently approved products, the production pipeline for viral vectors for chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell immunotherapy is very promising.

About Theravectys

Theravectys, a privately-owned biotech company, translates 20+ years of research on lentiviral vectors into a paradigm shift in vaccine development. Founded by pioneer technology inventor Dr. Pierre Charneau, as a spin-off of the Institut Pasteur, Theravectys leverages its proprietary platform and worldwide exclusive rights to Institut Pasteur’s intellectual property to deliver safe and efficient T-cell vaccines in oncology and infectious diseases. Theravectys’ on-going first-in-human Phase I/IIa clinical trial for its therapeutic vaccine candidate against HIV is projected to close in early 2019.