Cellmid 2017 Annual Report 13
Reduced cardio performance and chronic heart failure
continue to emerge as a cause of short to long-term
mortality and in significant healthcare burden with
associated costs, making this a highly valuable addition to
Kinera’s therapeutic asset portfolio.
In March 2017 Kinera secured funding for the development
of this portfolio, with plans to address three key areas of
the product development program in the future as follows:
• GMP manufacture of MK. Secured supply and expected
to deliver sufficient quantities of the protein by mid 2018
to complete pre-clinical development.
• Preclinical efficacy. Using the GMP quality MK pre-
clinical efficacy studies will be completed in a porcine
model of cardiac ischemia.
• Pharmacokinetic and early toxicology studies. A
rodent model will be used to assess how exogenous MK
behaves in a scenario modelled on the clinic, including
administering co-therapies, such as heparin.
PATENT PORTFOLIO UPDATE
Cellmid has the most significant intellectual property assets
related to MK worldwide and also has new patent families
pertaining to its FGF5 inhibitor technology. At the time of
writing this report the patent portfolio includes 58 patents
in 13 patent families, 45 granted patents, 12 applications
under examination and 1 new filing. The patents cover the
use of MK and anti-MK agents for therapeutic purposes
in a number of diseases, the use of MK as a diagnostic
marker in cancer and other disorders and the composition
of matter patents for novel FGF5 inhibitors.
Two new patents have been granted during the period.
The European Patent Office issued an allowance for patent
application number 11746751.4 entitled “Method of
Treatment or Prevention of Hair Loss or for Enhancement
of Hair Growth” in January 2017. This patent family
already includes allowances in the USA, Japan, Australia
and UK for the same patent family and with a 2031 expiry
it provides a pipeline opportunity in our midkine drug
development portfolio.
Notice of Allowance has also been issued by the European
Patents Office for Cellmid’s patent application 04717839.7
entitled “Preventative for Adhesion Following Abdominal
Surgery”. This patent protects the use of antibodies or
nucleotide based drugs targeting midkine that prevent the
formation of surgical adhesions.
This patent complements the already granted US patent
10/547,011 entitled “Agents for Preventing Post-
Laparotomy Adhesions”, which covers the use of MK
antibodies. Together with related patents already granted
in USA and Japan, the current European patent is the last
in this family, enabling extensive coverage of Lyramid’s
anti-MK agents for application in a major area of unmet
clinical need.
We are planning to build on the foundations from this
financial year and continue to broaden distribution
and increase sales for our consumer health products
globally. Momentum is also gathering behind our midkine
therapeutic programs, which we plan to develop through
our established and new partnerships.
We could not have achieved all this without our dedicated
directors, ably led by our Chairman, Dr David King. I
would also like to thank the Cellmid team, including
employees, advisers and associates, for their hard work
and commitment which made it possible to reach our goals
and beyond for the year.
Maria Halasz
CEO and Managing Director