Prime Medicine and Cimeio Therapeutics Announce Research Collaboration to Develop Prime Edited Shielded-Cell & Immunotherapy Pairs(Tm) for Genetic Diseases, Acute Myeloid Leukemia and Myelodysplastic Syndrome
June 22, 2023 at 08:00 am EDT
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Prime Medicine, Inc. and Cimeio Therapeutics, announced a research collaboration to combine their respective technologies, including Prime Medicine's Prime Editing platform and Cimeio's Shielded Cell and Immunotherapy Pairs (SCIP) platform. The goal of the research is to improve the safety and effectiveness of hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) transplants to treat genetic diseases, acute myeloid leukemia (AML), and myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), as well as enable the in vivo selection of edited HSCs to potentially remove the need for transplantation entirely. HSC transplant offers a potentially curative approach for many debilitating and life-threatening diseases, including malignancies such as AML and rare genetic diseases like Gaucher's and Hurler's, though its clinical utility is limited by the current need for myeloablative conditioning regimens and the risk of post-transplant progression of malignant disease. Cimeio's SCIP platform combined with Prime Editing may significantly improve the accessibility, eligibility and outcomes for patients who could benefit from HSC transplant. These combined technologies may also enable selection of in
vivo edited HSCs, which could allow for the treatment of genetic diseases without a transplant. Under the terms of the agreement, Prime Medicine will develop a Prime Editor for Cimeio's CD117 shielding variant that will then be evaluated by both companies. CD117 is a receptor tyrosine kinase expressed on normal HSCs and on leukemia cells, and therefore is an attractive target for an antibody-based conditioning therapy for patients needing a stem cell transplant, or for patients with AML or MDS needing new treatment options. If the research collaboration is successful, the companies will grant exclusive license options to each other for their technology. Prime Medicine will receive an exclusive option to license Cimeio's cell shielding technology for CD117-shielded HSC transplant, as well as in vivo editing of CD117-shielded HSCs, for genetic diseases, not including Sickle cell disease. Cimeio will receive an exclusive option to license Prime Medicine's Prime Editing technology for its CD117-shielded allogeneic HSC product for use in AML and MDS, and, potentially, a second shielding protein for use in AML and MDS. If the companies exercise their exclusive license options, they will each be eligible to receive economics on net sales of licensed products.
Prime Medicine, Inc. is a biotechnology company engaged in creating and delivering the gene editing therapies to patients. It deploys its Prime Editing platform, a gene editing technology, to develop a new class of differentiated, one-time genetic therapies. It is engaged in developing Prime Editors as a new class of therapeutics with transformative potential to expand the application of curative precision genetic medicines. It has built a diversified portfolio of investigational therapeutic programs organized around core areas of focus, namely hematology and immunology, liver, lung, ocular and neuromuscular. The programs within its other areas of focus are on earlier stages of preclinical development and include Liver programs, such as Wilson's disease and glycogen storage disease 1b; Lung program, such as Cystic fibrosis; Ocular program, such as Retinitis pigmentosa caused by Rhodopsin mutations, and Neuromuscular programs, including Friedreich's ataxia and myotonic dystrophy type 1.
Prime Medicine and Cimeio Therapeutics Announce Research Collaboration to Develop Prime Edited Shielded-Cell & Immunotherapy Pairs(Tm) for Genetic Diseases, Acute Myeloid Leukemia and Myelodysplastic Syndrome
PRIME MEDICINE, INC. 
