KaloBios Collaborates to Engineer Human Antibody Therapeutic Drugs

KaloBios Pharmaceuticals Inc. has announced the completion of a project for the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation (GNF) and Novartis to humaneer™ an antibody against an undisclosed target.

In exchange for creating this engineered human antibody therapeutic, KaloBios receives research and success fees, and can receive additional milestones and royalties upon completion of clinical trials.

The companies also announced the commencement of a second broader agreement.

Under the first agreement, GNF's high affinity and high potency non-human antibody drug candidate was humaneered™ by KaloBios.

The humaneered™ antibody that KaloBios delivered met or exceeded all of the GNF- and Novartis-defined success criteria, triggering a success payment.

"We are happy that GNF and Novartis have identified KaloBios as a partner who can help as part of their antibody development engine," said Geoffrey Yarranton, PhD, CEO of KaloBios.

"In turn, we are committed to helping GNF and Novartis make the best possible human antibody therapeutics."

Humaneering™ is KaloBios Pharmaceutical's proprietary method for converting non-human antibodies into engineered human antibodies for therapeutic drug applications.

The system has the advantage of maintaining epitope specificity and increasing affinity.

The humaneered™ antibodies are as close as, if not closer to human germline sequences than the products of fully human antibody generation techniques.

KaloBios is offering access to its humaneering™ capabilities on a limited basis.