OncoBone Ventures has signed cooperation framework agreements with three partners.
The company is a U.K. start up biotech looking to develop novel therapies for cancer patients with currently incurable bone metastases.
The partners are: Okayama University in Japan, the University of Bradford in the U.K., and The Development Center for Biotechnology in Taiwan.
The agreements include preclinical testing of therapeutic assets developed by partners for the treatment of cancer. The role of OncoBone Ventures will be to evaluate the efficacy of the therapeutic assets in preclinical bone metastasis models. This will be followed by safety assessments for those assets that demonstrate good efficacy for bone metastases.
With its wholly owned Finland-based subsidiary, OncoBone Therapeutics, the company will utilize its Biomarker Discovery Engine technology and a novel osteoimmuno-oncology (OIO) concept to guide the development of effective and safe immunotherapies for cancer patients with bone metastases.
Bone metastases provide a high unmet clinical need. About 70-80% of advanced breast and prostate cancer patients develop bone metastases and there are no effective treatments currently available. They can decrease quality of life, and can be painful. Metastases can cause severe bone complications, including spinal cord compression and fractures.
The American Cancer Society says that when cancer cells spread to the bones (bone metastases), they can cause problems such as pain, broken bones, or more serious events. Almost all cancers can spread to the bone. Cancers that often spread there include breast, lung, prostate, kidney, melanoma, ovarian, and thyroid. The spine is the most common site for bone metastases. Other common sites can be the hip bone, upper leg bone, upper arm bone, ribs, and the skull.
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