Gilead buys in vivo cell therapy firm Interius for $350m

Gilead Sciences' cell therapy unit Kite has reached an agreement to buy Interius BioTherapeutics, bolstering its efforts to develop therapies that do not require cells to be removed from the body first.

Kite is offering $350 million in cash to buy all the outstanding share capital in Philadelphia-based Interius, a privately held biotech which has advanced its first in vivo cell therapy into clinical testing for the treatment of B-cell malignancies.

According to Kite, Interius' platform enables the generation of CAR T-cells "directly within the patient's body and may offer a more durable and long-lasting therapeutic effect by inserting DNA into the patient's genome."

That sidesteps the usual procedure needed for CAR-T therapies, namely cell harvesting, engineering and reinfusion, which adds to the time and cost needed to deliver the treatment.

Interius is currently running a phase 1 trial of lead candidate INT2104, a gene therapy that delivers a CAR transgene to generate effector CAR-T and CAR-NK cells in vivo for the targeting of CD20-positive B cells.

The first patients have been dosed in the trial, which involves a single, intravenous infusion of an off-the-shelf dose of INT2104, and Interius has said it expects to report interim safety and proof-of-concept data at a scientific meeting before the end of this year.

Phil Johnson, Interius' chief executive, told pharmaphorum last year that while current CAR-Ts cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to make and administer, the company is hoping to bring the cost of making its in vivo candidates down to less than $10,000 per dose.

Becoming part of Kite "marks a pivotal step for Interius and the future of in vivo therapy, which has the potential to reduce treatment timelines, broaden access to care and improve outcomes for patients with aggressive or advanced disease," he said.

"With the addition of Kite's deep expertise and global infrastructure, we're well-positioned to move quickly into multiple therapeutic areas, expand access to cell therapies and deliver meaningful innovation to patients."

When pharmaphorum asked Gilead leadership about the in vivo space at a press event at this year's JP Morgan Healthcare conference, Kite EVP Cindy Perettie said that Gilead already had an investment in "one of the in vivo companies" and that "it's a space we're watching closely."

Other companies working on in vivo cell therapies include Philadelphia's Umoja BioPharma, which raised $100 million in a Series C earlier this year and has two candidates in early-stage clinical testing for B-cell cancers, and Boston's Kelonia Therapeutics, which started dosing patients in a phase 1 trial of a multiple myeloma therapy earlier this week.