LIfT BioSciences has received a significant investment in its mission to develop the first curative and affordable cell therapy for all solid tumours. Leading biotech investors include the co-founder of Abcam plc, Jonathan Milner, now an important cornerstone investor for further investment rounds with institutional investors.
“Whilst most immuno-oncology therapies, such as CAR-T cells and checkpoint inhibitors, are focused on the adaptive immune system”, said Jonathan Milner, CEO of Meltwind, “LIfT’s novel approach of using cancer-killing neutrophils (part of the innate immune system) opens up a whole new treatment paradigm for targeting cancer. This combined with the economic and operational advantages of allogeneic therapies could allow a wider range of patients to benefit from this potentially impactful treatment compared to current cell therapies.”
LIfT BioSciences was founded by Alex Blyth in 2014 following the death of his mother to pancreatic cancer, which gave the serial entrepreneur and healthcare industry expert impetus to find and develop a living cure for cancers with high unmet-need.
“Rapidly dividing cancer cells are able to adapt whereas targeted therapies are not,” says Alex Blyth, CEO of LIfT BioSciences. “This is a major flaw with current treatment options for patients, as their cancers are often only temporarily slowed before mutating and returning aggressively. At LIfT BioSciences, our research has found blood donors with no family history of cancer have such strong innate immune systems they can destroy cancer cells, irrespective of mutation or strain. We use these donors stem cell blue print to mass produce super immune cells for patients. We also feel the spiralling costs of new therapies is unsustainable, and so we are developing N-LIfT as an affordable cure to cancer”
The company’s first product, known as N-LIfT, will effectively transfer the innate immunity to cancer from exceptional donors (as illustrated in fig.1 on the right) to people living with cancer (on the left in fig.1) by mass producing cancer killing neutrophils from donor stem cells.
“Over the last two decades there has been a generational push towards more targeted and personalised cancer treatments,” says Dr Vance Naughton, Senior Research Scientist at LIfT BioSciences. “More recently, this approach has given way to engineering cells of the adaptive immune system, which ironically are unable to adapt to rapidly mutating cancers. We are developing N-LIfT as an off-the-shelf therapy for all solid tumours, regardless of mutational status, which we believe will be a paradigm-shifting change in therapeutic strategy.”
LIfT BioSciences welcomes the positive investor endorsement of their innovative cancer cell therapy which is being developed for a proof-of-concept trial which begins recruitment at the end of 2019 with expanding donor recruitment set to start shortly.
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About Neutrophil-only Leukocyte Infusion Therapy (N-LIfT)
N-LIfT uses exceptional stem cell-derived human neutrophils (a type of white blood cell or leukocyte) that have demonstrated the potential to destroy a range of solid tumours irrespective of strain or mutation, including sarcomas and carcinomas in vivo as well as selectively destroying cells from cervical, bladder, sarcoma, prostate, ovarian, breast and pancreatic cancers within 24 hours in multiple in vitro tests. 1 N-LIfT is an off-the-shelf, cancer-killing, neutrophil-based product that is allogeneic, mass-produced and patented with a first-in-class Advanced Therapeutic Medicinal Product (ATMP) status by the European Medicines Agency (EMA).2 LIfT has already proven to be 100% curative in mice3,4 and, with promising data in human cancers, N-LIfT is moving into clinical trials at the end of 2019.
About LIfT BioSciences
LIfT BioSciences is a socially-minded biotech bringing to market a first-in-class immuno-oncology cell therapy called N-LIfT, under development to destroy all solid tumours irrespective of mutation or strain. LIfT BioSciences is now seeking other institutional investors to join the investment syndicate to bring N-LIfT to patients. For further investor info or to find out more, visit www.liftbiosciences.com.
About Meltwind
Meltwind principally invests in early stage life science and healthcare companies and currently has a portfolio of over 40 companies. Meltwind is based in Cambridge UK and run by Dr Jonathan Milner – founder of Abcam plc and active angel investor.