MENLO PARK, Calif. & COPENHAGEN, Denmark– Evaxion Biotech A/S (Nasdaq: EVAX) and Personalis (Nasdaq: PSNL) announced today that Evaxion will deploy Personalis’ ImmunoID NeXT Platform in a Phase 2b trial to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Evaxion’s personalized cancer immunotherapy EVX-01. The study will combine EVX-01, a neoepitope-targeting immunotherapy based on Evaxion’s proprietary PIONEER® AI technology, with KEYTRUDA® (pembrolizumab) for the treatment of patients with metastatic melanoma.
“We believe we have found the key to efficiently activating the immune system to combat cancer. With our core AI tool called PIONEER, we accurately predict the patient’s most potent neoepitopes, which are the significant mutations of cancer. Then we train the immune system to target those exact mutations, not everything else. That means a higher precision in the therapy than the standard of care treatments out there,” said Lars Wegner, CEO of Evaxion. “We are happy to work with Personalis on this crucial next step when we embark on the Phase 2b study, potentially bringing us closer to fulfilling our aspiration of saving the lives of patients with our AI-powered immunotherapy.”
“Over the past decade, a number of drugs have emerged based on the discovery that the immune system plays a key role in fighting cancer. However, the development of new therapies has been challenged by difficulties in understanding the precise interaction between cancer and the immune system,” said John West, CEO and co-founder of Personalis. “ImmunoID NeXT provides a broad set of insights on tumor and immune biology. Our collaboration with Evaxion may contribute to a better understanding of how combination therapeutics can improve patient outcomes and offer the path to companion diagnostics when relevant biomarkers are identified.”
ImmunoID NeXT® provides a comprehensive, multidimensional view of both a tumor and its immune microenvironment from a single sample. The platform consolidates multiple biomarker assays into one, including advanced analysis of mechanisms of tumor escape, human leukocyte antigen typing and loss of heterozygosity, microsatellite instability, gene expression signatures, T-cell and B-cell receptor repertoires, and immunocellular quantification. ImmunoID NeXT offers a seamless platform for discovery, from translational testing to companion diagnostics.
