PharmAbcine signs a license agreement with Wincal Biopharm to expand indications of PharmAbcine’s existing assets to non-oncology areas

PharmAbcine announced that the company entered into a license agreement with Wincal Biopharm, a wholly owned US subsidiary of PharmAbcine, so that Wincal can expand the commercial value of PharmAbcine’s existing and future assets through R&D efforts. Under this agreement, Wincal will use PharmAbcine’s assets to develop new platforms that can enhance biological activities of traditional antibody therapeutic to target broader disease areas.

“This agreement will finally allow us to unlock the full potential of our assets,” said Dr. Jinsan Yoo, CEO of PharmAbcine. “We have long been aware of non-oncology potential of our assets but we could not do much about it due to limited resources. The biggest challenge was to hire R&D experts in Korea due mainly to a shortage arising from a bio venture boom in recent years.  We believe that this arrangement will enable us to get access to the talent pool, resources, and collaborative opportunity in the US.”

Wincal’s efforts will be spearheaded by Dr. Tae-Weon Lee, Chief Scientific Officer and a founding member of Wincal. Dr. Lee has over 20 years of pharmaceutical industry experience in overseeing drug discovery efforts and supporting scientific collaborative efforts with academics and pharmaceutical companies. Before joining Wincal, he was a director and a principal investigator leading the diabetes and heart failure drug discovery program at Amgen.

“Our team with years of big pharma drug discovery experiences is devoted to bringing a new cure for vascular diseases. We are developing an innovative eye-drop technology to deliver therapeutic antibodies to treat ophthalmological diseases such as age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, and diabetic macula edema. In addition, we are building a new platform to treat pulmonary edema (acute lung injury and acute respiratory distress syndrome), as well as plaque-induced vascular aneurysm (thoracic aortic aneurysm and abdominal aortic aneurysm),” said Dr Lee.