Elicera To Advance Next-Gen Cell Therapies Following IPO
Interview With CEO Jamal El-Mosleh
Executive Summary
Sweden-based Elicera Therapeutics is developing next-generation oncolytic viruses and “fourth-generation” CAR-T cells. CEO Jamal El-Mosleh sat down with In Vivo ahead of the company’s IPO.
With cell and gene therapy being one of the hottest areas of biotech, it can be hard to stand out. Elicera Therapeutics does so in a number of ways, believes CEO Jamal El-Mosleh.
Firstly, Elicera’s technology platform iTANK is enabling the biotech to develop fourth-generation chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cells, which El-Mosleh described as being “quite unusual” in that they represent only 16% of all CAR-T cells under development, with the majority of them remaining in academia. “The first-generation CAR-T cells were quite inadequate in their efficacy for different reasons,” he said, while “70% of CAR-T cells under development are second generation, so it [Elicera] is unique in that sense.”
The iTank platform, which the company says is theoretically applicable to all CAR-T cells and oncolytic viruses, is based on a neutrophil activating protein (NAP) derived from the bacteria helicobacter pylori. This stimulates the production of a variety of cytokines and chemokines that then initiate an effective immune response against cancer based on activation of CD8+ T-cells.
For CAR-T cells this involves adding a gene encoding for the production of NAP into the cell, allowing for a two-pronged attack on tumors via both the CAR-T cell therapy itself and the immune response initiated by NAP.
The current approved CAR-T therapies are all still in liquid tumors, but Elicera’s technology platform enables the company to target solid tumors. Elicera is also part of a small club of around 15 European biotechs that are developing CART-cells out of a global total of over 100 companies, and the only one in Sweden – the rest being split roughly equally between the US and China.
Elicera has two CAR-T candidates in its pipeline. The first, ELC-301, is being developed for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and is in Phase I/II trials. The second, ELC-401, is for solid tumors and is undergoing preclinical studies.
The biotech’s lead oncolytic virus candidate AdVince (ELC-100) is also in Phase I/II trials and is targeting neuroendocrine tumors (NETs). It is based on a genetically modified adenovirus Ad5PTD. The second oncolytic virus candidate, ELC-201, is a next generation oncolytic immunotherapy with three combined mechanisms of action, which is also unique to the company. The company hopes the treatment will work alongside established immune checkpoint inhibitors and could be used for all solid tumors.
Coming Of Age
Prior to joining Elicera as CEO in September of 2020, El-Mosleh was the first employee of another immuno-oncology company, Immunicum. He helped set it up, finance it, create an organizational structure and begin clinical trials. The company went public via an IPO in 2013 and El-Mosleh left the CEO position in 2017, as he felt the company had matured enough to benefit from someone with a more senior profile and network, and with experience securing licensing deals. He then set out to begin the company building journey again, “but this time with my own network and 10 years’ experience,” he said.
El-Mosleh noted that he is not a researcher, having trained initially in industrial engineering and management – a subject he chose to keep his options open. As he was graduating, a biotech entrepreneurship school was starting up, which he felt was a good fit between his interest in business and human biology. The latter interest was a long-held, El-Mosleh explained, and he had originally wanted to be a physician like his father.
Having now been in the cell and gene space since 2007, El-Mosleh – who is also one of In Vivo’s 2021 Rising Leaders – has a better perspective than most on how the sector has emerged. “There was a lot of skepticism against cell and gene therapies and immuno-oncology in particular,” said the CEO, with many in the industry not understanding the technology or believing it could work – including himself initially. “Now it is one of the hottest areas of drug development,” he said. “CAR-T cells are very intriguing because they can be extremely effective,” he noted, pointing to the success already seen in blood cancers and other non-solid tumors.
The technology behind the Elicera came from research done primarily by Professor Magnus Essand and had something of a turbulent beginning. The preclinical development was initially put on hold in 2011 due to lack of funding, and then in 2012 Essand was contacted by British author and journalist Alexander Masters to discuss the potential of oncolytic viruses to treat NETs, which affected a friend and colleague of his. This led to Masters writing an article in the Telegraph, which in turn prompted a successful crowdfunding campaign to finance a clinical trial, with the majority donated by oil tycoon Vince Hamilton. Elicera’s oncolytic virus for NET is named AdVince in his honor.
The Lockdown Experience
El-Mosleh has now experienced a biotech IPO roadshow both before and during the COVID lockdowns; and while the experience has been different in terms of results “it has worked out very well,” he said. There has been none of the usual travelling with the entire process being virtual.
The CEO commented that it is always nice to meet people face-to-face, but not having to travel had its benefits. He expects that once lockdowns have subsided the situation will settle into a mix of the two experiences. “I, for sure, expect people to travel less because I think this has opened people up to the fact that some of the travel and meetings are unnecessary,” he said.
One area that has seen more difficulty for Elicera, along with much of the industry, has been patient recruitment and the running of clinical trials. The company has opened additional trial sites as the COVID pandemic has rolled on. Having just one site in Sweden to begin with “made us vulnerable,” said El-Mosleh.
Remote working on the other hand had required little adaptation, he said, stating that both Elicera and Immunicumhad always worked remotely, given that they do not own their own research facilities. “Smaller biotech companies outsource a lot of their work so many of them are virtual in that sense,” he said.
Europe And Funding
El-Mosleh saw only one option for Elicera’s IPO – NASDAQ. This is the case for much of Europe’s biotech scene which, despite some recent progress, still struggles with company growth when compared with the US. The company is listing on the NASDAQ First North Growth Market.
Venture capital risk appetite was part of the issue, said El-Mosleh, arguing that the large players preferred to wait until biotechs had developed from the early science stage before investing. “It’s a little bit of catch-22 for these companies,” said El-Mosleh, “The problem is that, to get to that point where they are investable by VC firms – it takes money that they aren’t getting.”
He has begun to see some progress with early-stage VC involvement but notes that this often comes with them taking more control and responsibility from the biotechs.
Looking forward with Elicera, El-Mosleh said that he was looking forward to successfully completing the company’s IPO which will secure funding for clinical trials. “What motives and drives me is to reach patients,” he said, following the IPO the company expects to have enough funding to take all four of its projects “as fast as possible to patient studies."
El-Mosleh's ambition is to put “Elicera on the map of cutting-edge cell and gene therapy.”