Poseida Therapeutics Inc., headquartered in San Diego, spun-out of Transposagen Biopharmaceuticals in 2015. The company is translating best-in-class gene engineering technologies into lifesaving cell therapies. This includes developing CAR T-cell immunotherapies for multiple myeloma (phase I), prostate and other cancer types, as well as gene therapies for orphan diseases.
Poseida has assembled a suite of industry-leading gene engineering technologies, including the piggyBac™ DNA Modification System, TAL-CLOVER™ and Cas-CLOVER™ site-specific nucleases, and Footprint-Free™ Gene Editing (FFGE).
The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) has awarded a $3.99 million CLIN 1 grant to support the late stage preclinical development of Poseida’s P-PSMA101 product candidate. P-PSMA-101 is a chimeric antigen receptor T cell (CAR-T) immunotherapy designed to supercharge a patient’s own T-cells to safely and effectively eliminate tumor cells carrying prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA), which is expressed on the majority of prostate cancer cells.
P-PSMA-101 employs a PSMA-specific CAR molecule and is engineered using a non-viral gene delivery system called the piggyBac™ DNA Modification System, which leverages the technology’s capability to deliver up to 30 times more cargo than traditional virus-based CAR-T cell modification systems.
P-PSMA-101 has demonstrated potent preclinical anti-tumor activity, persistent and durable response, significant T stem cell memory, a high concentration of P-PSMA-101 modified T-cells and no T-cell exhaustion. A unique feature of P-PSMA-101 and other Poseida CAR-T products is their exceptionally high percentage of stem cell memory T-cells, which has been shown in preclinical studies to lead to unprecedented durability of response without re-administration of treatment.
Poseida anticipates filing an Investigational New Drug application with the US FDA and starting a clinical trial of P-PSMA-101 in 2019.
“P-PSMA-101 carries many of the same desirable features found in our P-BCMA-101 CAR-T program for the treatment of multiple myeloma that is currently demonstrating best-in-class characteristics in an ongoing clinical trial – features that may overcome the challenges that have limited the potential of CAR-T therapies in solid tumors,” … “We are honored that CIRM has taken an interest in our unique and differentiated approach to CAR-T product development, and has now provided grant support for two of our CAR-T programs.” – Eric Ostertag, M.D., Ph.D., chief executive officer of Poseida.
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