Valanx BioTech develop targeted therapy technology to combat cancer – RebelBio Review

Austrian spin-out Valanx BioTech was founded by Michael Lukesch and Partik Fladischer and may be set to revolutionise the cancer treatment through a new targeted therapy. Over 12.7 million people worldwide discover they have cancer each year and a further 7.6 million die from the disease. These figures highlight the urgent need for innovative solutions to an age-old adversary.

The technology enables the synthesis of custom, programmable protein-conjugates at a 50-fold reduced cost to competitors in the biomanufacturing industry – and at a faster speed.

Speaking at the RebelBio Demo Day at Imperial College London, co-founder Michael noted that “Healing for a cancer patient means getting very sick”

“Chemotherapy hits everything in the hope that cancer dies before the patient. Well often that’s just not achieved. To better target the cancer, scientists use antibodies called proteins. Antibodies are able to recognise the cancer and then bind to it”

Valanx BioTech takes advantage of this phenomena and can attach therapeutic drugs to these antibodies. In doing so, it ensures the therapeutic drugs make their way directly to the cancer which can lead to a reduction in side-effects.

“It is a technology that lets you make a single defined antibody with a defined number of drugs attached to it” which is a significant improvement on current technologies that cannot control how many drugs end up on the antibody. This means they can ensure different antibodies have the same number of drugs attached to them.

Valanx BioTech is seeking an investment of €300,000 over 18 months.

(Breakdown: €220,000 towards Mammalian Cells Production, €50,000 for Bacteria Production, and €30,000 to ignite partnerships)

The company has already secured a €180,000 research grant.

After developing bacterial and mammalian production systems they will aim to source two licencing agreements with pharmaceutical companies.

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