Celldex Therapeutics has halted work on its solid-tumor-focused bispecific as the biotech prioritizes its work in inflammation.
The company had completed a phase 1 trial of CDX-585, a bispecific antibody targeting PD-1 and ILT4 in patients with advanced or metastatic solid tumors that had not been halted by standard-of-care therapy. The biotech had previously touted the potential of ILT4 as an “important immune checkpoint on myeloid cells” that could be combined with the “highly active PD-1 blockade.”
But Celldex has decided not to take CDX-585 further due to “prioritizing our expanding clinical development program in the inflammatory space,” the company explained in its third-quarter earnings release.
That inflammation pipeline is headed up by barzolvolimab, a humanized monoclonal antibody that works by blocking the signaling of an enzyme called c-Kit on mast cells. The drug scored a phase 2 win in a chronic form of hives over the summer, leading Celldex CEO Anthony Marucci to describe barzolvolimab as the first drug to “demonstrate statistically significant and clinically meaningful results in a large, randomized, placebo-controlled study in chronic inducible urticaria.”
The biotech has already launched a phase 3 trial of barzolvolimab in a different form of urticaria and said in yesterday’s release that it remains on track to launch a late-stage trial in chronic inducible urticaria next year.
While Celldex has dropped its cancer-focused bispecific, the company does have another bispecific in its pipeline that better aligns with its inflammation-focused strategy. That asset, dubbed CDX-622, targets both the stem cell factor and thymic stromal lymphopoietin pathways and is being prepped for a phase 1 study in healthy patients with an eye on treating inflammatory and fibrotic disorders down the line.