compugen
compugen
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Compugen (US)
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It is one of the biggest dream companies that ever existed in Israel. The company specializes in computational biology, it started in the field of mapping the human genome, moved to focus on identifying proteins that may be a target for drug treatment, mainly for types of cancer. Over the years the company has participated in trials with huge pharmaceutical companies. One such mall in front of Bristol Myers was abandoned about a year ago and the company decided to focus on a product it discovered while on the move – antibodies to cancer diseases.
Compugen has burned over half a billion dollars to date. The company has a lot of knowledge and experience. On the other hand, you can look at the glass half empty and say that she has failed every time and there is no reason for her to succeed now. But in the meantime, about 80 million dollars are in the cash register, while the company’s value on the stock exchange is 75 million dollars. Those who invest in the company basically get the activity for free, although the money is burned quickly – these 84 million dollars will be enough for two years. So soon it is possible that the company will return to the market to recruit.
Compugen faces the danger of being deleted from the Nasdaq and moving to the secondary list, if by the end of the year the company’s stock does not return to trading at a value of one dollar or more. The CFO of the company – Alberto Sessa, details in an interview with Bizportal the situation of the firm and what is expected in the coming year.
What are the company’s most significant events in the coming year?
“The company in 2023 has two clinical programs, there are two clinical programs that are based on two new drug targets that the company discovered through computational means, COM701, an anti-PVRIG antibody, and COM902, an anti-TIGIT antibody. The uniqueness of the company that it developed and uses artificial intelligence with It discovers new medicinal targets against which it develops drugs in the form of anticancer drugs. The company operates in a field called immuno-oncology, meaning that the drugs it develops enable the immune system to act against cancer.
“Using our computational platform, we discovered two new drug targets in the laboratory. Yesterday we announced the treatment of the first patient in a feasibility trial on up to 20 patients to evaluate the triple combination of COM701, an anti-PVRIG antibody, in combination with COM902, an anti-TIGIT antibody with an antiPD-1 antibody , in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer. The decision to focus on this indication is based on the encouraging data we previously reported at the 2022 Society for Cancer Immunotherapy Annual Meeting after dual blockade of PVRIG and .PD. We expect to report preliminary results of the experiment by the end of 2023, final results will be in 2024. Also, we expect to start a trial to evaluate the same triple combination to test the feasibility of ovarian cancer in the second quarter of this year. In this experiment as well, we expect to report preliminary findings by the end of the year.”
When are the revenues from this experiment expected to arrive?
“In the middle of 2024 we will be able to prepare to conduct larger trials – phase 2 or phase 3, with the aim of conducting these trials in cooperation with one of the major pharmaceutical companies, Compared to the current phase of the experiment, since these experiments (phase 2 or 3) require a very large amount of money. Usually the experiments are conducted in a way where there is a certain payment in advance and then a payment for milestones throughout the experiment and this is what we will be looking for.”
Regarding the second trial, Sasa says: “Similar to the colon cancer trial, we are doing the trial in this type of cancer without collaboration and we are recruiting 40 patients and expect preliminary and final results at the end of 2023 and mid-2024, respectively. This is a follow-up trial in this type of cancer, and here we will also look for a partner in case the results are good enough.”
Are there possible sources of income beyond these two experiments?
“At the same time as the two trials we are running, there is a third trial, based on our anti-TIGIT antibody, which is being done by our partner AstraZeneca. Last month they announced that they are expected to enter phase 3 clinical trials in the middle of this year. They are doing the trial at their own expense and they are We are paid for progressing development milestones. In 2022, AstraZeneca advanced the product to phase 2 of clinical trials in metastatic non-small cell lung cancer, a move that led to a payment of $7.5 million to Compugen.”
What is the company’s outlook in terms of cash?
“Regarding the two experiments we are conducting ourselves, we have the money to finance them. As of the first of January we have about 84 million dollars, this money will be enough for us until the end of 2024, which is a very long time in terms of what we are doing and this money will be enough to finish the experiments and reach with results”.
Is there a certain plan for raising funds in case one or several of the experiments fail?
“I can’t comment on current planning, the final results will only be in 2024 and we have enough money to get there” says Sessa and adds “at the same time we have the asset that AstraZeneca is developing and also another treatment that is currently in the preclinic (before the human trial), which is very innovative And about it, as is customary in the industry, we are talking with big pharmaceutical companies.”
If so, what investors are seeing is that there are currently three company trials, an amount of cash that will likely burn through about the end of 2024, and uncertainty about near-term revenue?
“True, that’s the way this industry is run, but at the same time I can say that we are constantly looking at the market and I personally talk to investors all the time. Things are very dynamic, but what you say is true, I can’t point to any income is expected, because it does not depend on me. We are of course also affected by our competitive environment – there are several global pharmaceutical companies that are developing their own antibodies against the TIGIT target protein. For example, the pharmaceutical giant Roche is expected to report the results of a phase 3 clinical trial of its anti-TIGIT in the second half of The second of 2023. We will note that today in the war against cancer there is a lot of talk about combinations. We believe that for certain patients who do not respond to the drugs that exist on the market today, the combination we have developed can be more effective than the existing treatment.”