“The signing of this agreement builds upon previous manufacturing work through which fundamental cGMP processing parameters for L-DOS47 have been developed,” said John Docherty, Helix’s vice president of Corporate Development.
“BioVectra dcl is a natural choice for our clinical manufacturing program requirements because in addition to their high caliber capabilities in the cGMP production of biopharmaceuticals, they are also one of the largest North American producers of the urease substance at the heart of our L-DOS47 drug product.”
During 2007, Helix intends to continue to work on completing the remaining preclinical animal testing work with L-DOS47, in parallel with finalizing its clinical manufacturing activities. In working to complete this program, Helix is focused on conducting a phase I trial with L-DOS47 in patients with adenocarcinoma of the lung.
L-DOS47 combines Helix’s proprietary DOS47 new drug candidate with a highly specific single domain antibody to form a potential new targeted drug product for the treatment of adenocarcinoma of the lung. L-DOS47 is thought to function by leveraging a natural process in the body called the urea cycle to produce an anticancer effect.