BIOVECTRA partners on Canadian solution to establish a domestic supply chain for immunotherapies

Posted on by BIOVECTRA

 

BIOVECTRA is pleased to be part of a Canadian solution with our NGEN partners CCRM, Precision Nanosytems (Cytiva), Northern RNA, and OmniaBio to establish a Canadian supply chain network to accelerate and standardize lentiviral vector development from clinical to commercial manufacturing.  Together we are building a next-generation immunotherapy manufacturing platform that will be used for new treatments to fight rare and difficult-to-treat diseases.  Cell and Gene Therapies (CGT) are at the cutting-edge of patient care, tailored to the patient by reprograming targeted cells to stimulate their immune response to fight acquired and inherited diseases. CAR-T,  CAR-NK-based therapies, the subject of this collaboration, are promising immunotherapies for cancer treatment.

Lentiviral vector-based CGT was also shown to be efficient and safe to alleviate genetic disorders by restoring or altering certain sets of cells, leading to the development of innovative treatments for hematological (β-thalassemia), neurometabolic and immunodeficiency diseases1, to name a few.

The aim of this forward-looking collaboration is to make extremely costly CGTs more accessible by improving the efficiency of the manufacturing process and to help establish a domestically accessible CGT supply chain.

This month, Scientists at BIOVECTRA’s Dartmouth-based laboratory will initiate the development of GMP-grade Gag-Pol, Rev, and VSV-G plasmids. This is the starting material to produce lentiviral vectors, which are commonly used to stably transfer and express genes in cell therapy manufacturing. The modification of the cells is performed ex vivo and requires innovative and personalized manufacturing strategies. These plasmids will be designed to be off-the-shelf material available to customers producing lentiviral vectors starting in 2025.

Partnership is a driver of innovation and BIOVECTRA is pleased to be part of this collaboration that will help to accelerate the development of a new manufacturing approach that can help make these therapies accessible to more patients in the future.

  1. Bulcha, J.T., Wang, Y., Ma, H. et al. Viral vector platforms within the gene therapy landscape. Sig Transduct Target Ther 6, 53 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41392-021-00487-6

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  • 20+ years at GSK, leading R&D activities on multiple vaccine programs
  • Recently held positions in industry include: Senior Director (Function Head), Protein Biochemistry; Director, Antigen Design & Prototype Production; and, Associate Director, Antigen Design and Protein Characterization.
  • Key areas of expertise are:
    • Process development of protein Biologics/Recombinant Antigens
    • Recombinant protein expression (mammalian, insect, yeast, bacterial)
    • Production/design of Viral Vectors, mRNA vaccines, Bacterial outer membrane vesicles
    • Protein Engineering and Structural Biology
    • Defining quality attributes, biophysical characterization of proteins, and analytical strategy
  • Post graduate degrees in Functional Genomics (Université Laval) and Bioinformatics (MIT); M. Sc. Microbiology and Immunology (Laval).
  • 25+ Patent & 5 Scientific Publications

Normand Blais – Senior Director Development & Innovation, Biologics

  • 20+ years at GSK, leading R&D activities on multiple vaccine programs
  • Recently held positions in industry include: Senior Director (Function Head), Protein Biochemistry; Director, Antigen Design & Prototype Production; and, Associate Director, Antigen Design and Protein Characterization.
  • Key areas of expertise are:
    • Process development of protein Biologics/Recombinant Antigens
    • Recombinant protein expression (mammalian, insect, yeast, bacterial)
    • Production/design of Viral Vectors, mRNA vaccines, Bacterial outer membrane vesicles
    • Protein Engineering and Structural Biology
    • Defining quality attributes, biophysical characterization of proteins, and analytical strategy
  • Post graduate degrees in Functional Genomics (Université Laval) and Bioinformatics (MIT); M. Sc. Microbiology and Immunology (Laval).
  • 25+ Patent & 5 Scientific Publications

Oliver Technow - Chief Executive Officer

  • Industry Master Degree from Frankfurt Chamber of Commerce, Frankfurt Germany.
  • More than 20 years of global pharmaceutical industry experience.
  • Held numerous leadership positions in commercial development, marketing and brand management, and lifecycle management and has extensive product launch and market access expertise in Europe and North America.
  • In 1997, joined Eisai GmbH in Frankfurt, Germany and in 2002, was appointed Director, CNS Business Unit; in 2006, was appointed Vice President, Head of Global Marketing for Eisai Inc. in Woodcliff Lake, NJ;  in 2011, was appointed Vice President, Established Products Business Unit; in 2013, was appointed President & General Manager for Eisai Limited in Mississauga, ON.
  • Appointed President of BIOVECTRA Inc., December 10, 2015.
  • Board Director for BIOTECanada
  • Member of the Steering Council of Innovative Medicines Canada (IMC)
  • In 2017, appointed to the Government of Canada’s Health/Bio-sciences Strategic Economic Table
  • In November 2019, promoted to Chief Executive Officer at BIOVECTRA
  • In June 2020, named new Chair of PEI BioAlliance Board of Directors