Affimed spins out antibody discovery to AbCheck
Affimed Therapeutics, a German antibody company, is to concentrate all activities on the development of in-house drug candidates derived from its TandAb technology platform. In line with this, the company has spun-out its antibody discovery activities into a new company, AbCheck, headquartered in Plzen, Czech Republic.
Affimed Therapeutics, a German antibody company, is to concentrate all activities on the development of in-house drug candidates derived from its TandAb technology platform. In line with this, the company has spun-out its antibody discovery activities into a new company, AbCheck, headquartered in Plzen, Czech Republic.
Heidelberg-based Affimed will now concentrate on preparing the first clinical study for its lead product AFM 13 to treat Hodgkin's lymphoma.
Further antibody programmes are in advanced preclinical development for the treatment of Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma, solid tumours, autoimmune diseases and asthma.
AbCheck will continue Affimed's activities in antibody discovery. Additionally, it will provide antibody discovery and engineering expertise to biotech and pharma partners and provide access to its patent-protected technologies. Commercial partners will also have access to Affimed's therapeutic antibody libraries.
AbCheck specialises in customised antibody discovery and generation for therapeutic applications. Based on three fully human antibody libraries, the portfolio covers all aspects regarding the generation of therapeutic antibodies from research to lead optimisation.
Dr Volker Lang, formerly chief business officer at Affimed, has become managing director of AbCheck.
Dr Thomas Hecht, chairman of the supervisory board of Affimed, said: "With the company's transition into a clinical development organisation, we feel it is necessary further to focus our business model. At the same time, this transition frees up new potential for the commercialisation of our discovery expertise and a broad proprietary technology portfolio."