Crown Bioscience, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Crown Bioscience International (TWSE:6554) and a global drug discovery and development services company providing translational platforms to advance oncology, inflammation, cardiovascular and metabolic disease research, announced today a strategic licensing agreement with CBT Pharmaceuticals (CBT), a U.S. and China-based innovative biopharmaceutical company committed to becoming a leader in the discovery and development of oncology combination therapies.

The agreement gives CBT exclusive world-wide development and commercialization rights to a novel, recombinant, human monoclonal antibody which targets a differentiated epitope on the cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen-4 (CTLA-4) molecule.  Binding of this antibody to CTLA-4 blocks the interaction of CTLA-4 with its ligands CD80/CD86 thus allowing the cytotoxic T cells to function actively.

Under the terms of this global licensing agreement, CBT gains access to a third checkpoint inhibitor to complement the existing immuno-oncology pipeline of PD-1 and PD-L1 inhibitors. CrownBio is eligible to receive potential future development, regulatory and sales-based milestones payments over $47 M, as well as royalties on net sales. Once the recommended Phase 1 monotherapy portion of the Phase 1/2 trial is completed, combination with other complementary therapies in CBT’s immuno-oncology and targeted therapy portfolios will be initiated.

"This acquisition from CrownBio is another building block in our strategy to develop a portfolio of programs in combination with our pipeline of immuno-oncology and targeted therapies that we believe will lead to a meaningful durable clinical benefit and impact on cancer survival in variety of malignancies and in larger proportion of cancer patients," said Sanjeev Redkar, PhD, Chief Executive Officer and President of CBT.  He continued, "The CTLA-4 asset fits well with our ongoing clinical studies and we hope to advance an additional three single agent and two combination clinical trials are expected to enter the clinic by the end of 2018."

Tillman Pearce, MD, Interim Chief Medical Officer, added "The CTLA-4 asset demonstrated stronger binding and its performance in nonclinical models compares quite favorably to the marketed CTLA-4 which may allow for differentiation in the clinic."

Dr. Jean Pierre Wery, CEO of CrownBio stated, "CrownBio enables biopharmaceutical clients and partners the scientific platform to advance drugs to market to improve treatment options to patients. This includes strategic licensing of proprietary antibodies.  We are pleased to support CBT’s innovative immuno-oncology pipeline by licensing our CTLA-4 recombinant, human monoclonal antibody."

About CBT Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

CBT Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is an innovative biopharmaceutical company committed to becoming a global leader in the discovery and development of oncology combination therapies by focusing on therapeutics harnessing the immune system and targeting specific molecular pathways to tame cancer. The acquisition of the CTLA-4 compliments the company’s existing pipeline of four development-stage assets. CBT has two novel humanized monoclonal antibodies – CBT-501, targeting the Programmed Death-1 (PD-1) membrane receptor of immune cells, as well as Programmed Death Ligand-1 (PD-L1) (CBT-502) that restores the body’s immune system to recognize and kill cancer cells. In addition, CBT-101, is an oral c-MET inhibitor targeting the epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) pathway and CBT-102, an oral multi-targeted kinase inhibitor that targets uncontrolled growth signaling pathways. The company was founded in 2016. 

About Crown Bioscience, Inc.
CrownBio is a global drug discovery and development solutions company providing translational platforms to advance oncology, inflammation, cardiovascular and metabolic disease research. With an extensive portfolio of relevant models and predictive tools, CrownBio enables clients to deliver superior clinical candidates.

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