Avacta shares surged on Tuesday after CEO Dr Alastair Smith said he believed Avacta are ‘on the verge of a paradigm shift in how chemotherapy is delivered to cancer patients.”
UK biotech company Avacta Group has announced positive results from the latest cohort in its clinical trial of AVA6000, the company’s targeted chemotherapy drug.
In the sixth dosing cohort of the phase 1 study, AVA6000 continued to demonstrate an excellent safety profile. The drug was well tolerated by patients despite receiving nearly 3 times the typical dose of chemotherapy drug doxorubicin. Importantly, the toxicities associated with doxorubicin were not observed.
Avacta shares were 10% higher at 117p at the time of writing on Tuesday.
The favorable safety data will allow Avacta to progress to a seventh dosing cohort, where patients will receive the highest dose yet at 3.5 times the standard doxorubicin level.
After completing the current study, Avacta now plans to initiate a trial evaluating more frequent dosing of AVA6000 as a first line treatment for soft tissue sarcoma patients. This aims to determine the optimal dosing regimen for a potential pivotal phase 2 trial in 2024.
In addition to safety, the company reported signs of efficacy including significant tumor reduction in a sarcoma patient. More detailed clinical data from the phase 1 trial is expected in Q4 2023.
AVA6000 is Avacta’s targeted form of doxorubicin, designed to reduce side effects by releasing chemotherapy specifically in tumor tissue. The positive phase 1 results so far indicate it may allow higher and more frequent dosing compared to standard doxorubicin treatment.
“I believe that we are on the verge of a paradigm shift in how chemotherapy is delivered to cancer patients,” said Dr Alastair Smith, Chief Executive of Avacta Group.
“The safety and initial efficacy signals emerging from the data in the AVA6000 Phase 1 study are very encouraging indeed. The pre|CISIONTM platform is doing exactly what it was designed to do – target the release of active chemotherapy to the tumour tissue, sparing healthy tissues and improving the safety and tolerability of the drug whilst delivering potentially superior efficacy.
“I’m particularly pleased that, even at this early stage and in this patient group, we have a confirmed, significant response in a patient with soft tissue sarcoma, as well as other positive signals across a number of other patients.”
