Pure MHC to Partner with AbbVie on Oncology Research

Emergent Technologies, Inc. (ETI) announced that its target discovery portfolio company, Pure MHC, and global biopharmaceutical company, AbbVie (NYSE:ABBV), will embark on a research and license agreement to discover and validate peptide targets for use with T-cell receptor therapeutics in several types of cancers.

T-cells play a key role in regulating immune responses to tumors. Receptors on the surface of T-cells recognize tumor antigens in the form of small peptides and provide a selective pathway for targeted cancer therapies. Pure MHC has developed technology to identify novel, tumor-associated peptides based on innovation licensed from the University of Oklahoma.

The collaboration between AbbVie and Pure MHC will seek to identify a library of peptide targets for further research across multiple tumor types and advance AbbVie’s ongoing development of next-generation immuno-oncology therapies.

“Our partnership with Pure MHC will advance our research within immuno-oncology, an important frontier in the ongoing fight against cancer,” said Steve Davidsen, Ph.D., vice president, oncology discovery, AbbVie.

“We are excited to partner with AbbVie in the immuno-oncology space leveraging Pure MHC’s over 15 years of peptide target discovery with AbbVie’s deep clinical expertise to utilize these targets in new and improved therapies for the treatment of cancer,” said Thomas Harlan, Chief Executive Officer at ETI and Pure MHC.

“We’re tremendously proud of the effort by the Pure MHC team and Emergent Technologies,” said James Bratton, Assistant Vice President, Economic Development and Executive Director, Office of Technology Development at the University of Oklahoma. “Without their vision, expertise and dedication, none of this would have been possible. This collaboration with AbbVie demonstrates how commercialization of university research can have a lasting, positive impact on the world.”