The biotech company Peptomyc SL announced today that it has been awarded €5 million blended financing from the Horizon Europe, European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator Program. The grant will fund a phase 1b clinical trial in first-line metastatic pancreatic cancer patients to investigate OMO-103 in combination with standard-of-care chemotherapy.
The EIC Accelerator program is a highly competitive program of the European Commission that provides small or medium size enterprise (SME) awardees with funding, coaching and business acceleration services. This is a very competitive call, which usually funds only 2,5-5% of the applications.
Peptomyc’s objective for this project is to conduct a phase 1b multicenter single-arm clinical trial to investigate OMO-103 in combination with the standard of care regimen Gemcitabine and Nab-Paclitaxel in metastatic Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma (PDAC) patients in first line, at the University Vall d’Hebron Hospital together and 3 other leading hospital centers in Spain.
Laura Soucek, co-founder and CEO of Peptomyc, head of VHIO’s Models of Cancer Therapies Group and ICREA professor said “We are thrilled by this achievement: this endorsement by the EIC is a testament to our innovative strides to develop groundbreaking cancer therapies. With this backing, we can accelerate our research and bring new hope in the fight against cancer.”
Jörg Klumbis, CFO of Peptomyc, added: “This grant is the result of the excellent work performed by Peptomyc’s team. It reinforces our financial stability and capability to drive our innovative cancer therapies forward.”
Marie-Eve Beaulieu, co-founder and CSO of Peptomyc said: “Our team is incredibly grateful for this opportunity to further our mission, and we are committed to advancing our pioneering work to bring better solutions to patients.”
About Omomyc, the MYC inhibitor developed by Peptomyc at VHIO
Under normal conditions MYC is a transcription factor that regulates the activation of genes related to cell division in an orderly manner. Frequently dysregulated in many human cancers, MYC drives the transcription of genes implicated in the uncontrolled growth of tumor cells and the development of metastasis and disease recurrence.
The Omomyc molecule, developed by Peptomyc, is a therapeutic mini-protein capable of inhibiting the MYC oncogene and based on the research of Dr. Laura Soucek. “This is the first mini-protein directed at MYC that has successfully passed a phase I trial whose results have shown that it is capable of inhibiting the function of this oncogene in a safe and effective way,” explains Dr. Laura Soucek, who has dedicated more than 25 years to research into therapies directed against the MYC gene”.
About Peptomyc
Peptomyc (www.peptomyc.com) is a spin-off from VHIO – the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology – and ICREA – the Catalan Institute of Research and Advanced Studies -, founded in December 2014 in Barcelona, Spain. The company is focused on the development of innovative cell penetrating peptides (CPPs) targeting the Myc oncoprotein for cancer treatment and based on Dr. Soucek’s scientific research in Omomyc (the best direct Myc inhibitor known to date) over the last twenty years. It is the first company to have successfully completed a Phase 1 clinical trial with a direct MYC inhibitor.
