Promatix Biosciences Wins Innovate UK Grant for Cancer ADC Program

Promatix Biosciences Ltd, a UK-based biotechnology company developing innovative new classes of cancer therapies, has been awarded a grant under the Innovate UK Biomedical Catalyst 2025: Industry-led R&D small projects competition, which will support continued development of the company’s lead program, PBS293-exatecan, an EGFR × EphA2 cis-bispecific ADC for the treatment of CRC and other solid tumors.

The award will fund the scale-up and conjugation of PBS293 with an exatecan payload, additional preclinical proof-of-concept studies in both CDX and PDX models of CRC, and IND-enabling regulatory safety studies to support the nomination of PBS293-exatecan as a development candidate. In parallel, Promatix will apply its discovery platform to evaluate oesophageal cancer and NSCLC as additional indications. The work will be conducted with established UK-based contract research organizations, including Abzena, Crown Bioscience and Labcorp UK.

“This award from Innovate UK enables us to generate the additional preclinical data needed to move PBS293-exatecan towards development candidate nomination,” said Dr. Roy Pettipher, Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder of Promatix. “By scaling up our lead conjugate and testing it in both cell-line and patient-derived models, alongside the regulatory safety studies expected for an ADC, we plan to assemble the industry-standard data package that partners and investors are looking for.”

“Non-dilutive funding of this kind is strong external validation of both our lead program and the proteomics-driven discovery platform behind it,” added Dr. Michael Hunter, CEO and Co-Founder of Promatix. “It will enable us to advance PBS293-exatecan in colorectal cancer while extending the same logic-gated approach to further solid  tumors, including oesophageal and non-small cell lung cancer.”