VGX Pharma, Dowpharma Sign Development Pact

VGX Pharmaceuticals and Dowpharma contract manufacturing services, a business unit of The Dow Chemical Co., have signed an R&D Agreement to advance the development of VGX-100, VGX’s novel cancer compound in preclinical development. Under the terms of the agreement, Dowpharma will perform a feasibility study for the expression of VGX-100 using its Pfenex Expression Technology. Pfenex Expression Technology accelerates speed to market for vaccines and biotherapeutics by improving quality, boosting yields of protein expression, and reducing the cost of existing microbial systems.

VGX Pharmaceuticals has discovered that specific viral proteins can induce selective apoptosis (programmed cell death) in rapidly dividing cancer cells without affecting normal cells. Preclinical studies have found that VGX-100 induces tumor death through apoptosis in a variety of established human tumor cells derived from the breast, prostate, brain, and other sources. The initial clinical studies will target individuals with Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. “This is an important relationship for us as we continue to develop VGX-100,” said J. Joseph Kim, Ph.D., president and chief executive officer of VGX Pharmaceuticals. “The signing of the agreement came at the perfect time in the development cycle of this discovery. The feasibility studies will determine the extent to which we can expedite the production of our protein from the laboratory to production, so we can rapidly advance VGX-100 into the clinic.”

“Pfenex Expression Technology is proven to improve protein production and consistently outperforms other microbial expression systems,” said Nick Hyde, global business director, Dowpharma. “We look forward to working with VGX to increase protein yields and expedite the development of this promising compound.”