Dr. Madi Madiyalakan reports

QUEST PHARMATECH PROVIDES PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT UPDATE

A U.S. patent has been granted to Quest Pharmatech Inc.'s lead product candidate MAb AR 9.6 that will protect many isoforms of monoclonal antibody including IgE and its AllergoOncology technology.

MAb AR 9.6 licensed from University of Nebraska Medical Centre binds to a novel tumour associated marker (truncated O-Glycan bearing MUC16) and has potential use in targeted cancer therapy for pancreatic, ovarian and breast cancer. MAb AR 9.6 blocks the activation of growth factor receptors and thereby inhibits phosphorylation of Akt, which leads to reduced cell proliferation, in vivo tumour growth and metastasis. Quest has also established and validated the tumour-targeting ability of AR9.6 as a promising theranostic agent in animal models for immunopositron emission tomography, fluorescence guided surgery and radioimmunotherapy. This lead product has already generated six manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals and two United States patents, and the program is in the late preclinical stage.

Quest is a pioneer in the field of monoclonal antibody-based cancer therapy and has developed the antibody-based immunotherapy technology by using very low dose murine monoclonal antibodies against secreted tumour associated antigens to stimulate the immune system to fight against cancer. The antibody technology was transferred to OncoQuest, in which Quest presently holds a 42.5-per-cent ownership interest, in 2015 for further development and was subsequently purchased by a Korean-based company pursuant to an asset transfer agreement in April, 2020. The antibody immunotherapy using oregovomab is now being developed by Korea-based CanariaBio Co. Ltd. (KOSDAQ symbol -- 016790) which has recently completed the enrolment of 602 patients in its phase III clinical study (FLORA-5; QPT-ORE-005; GOG-3035; NCT04498117) with participation of 163 sites across 16 countries.

"At Quest we continue the development of antibody-based technology with the Anti-MUC16 MAb AR9.6 for the treatment of pancreatic and other cancers," said Dr. Madi Madiyalakan, chief executive officer for the company. "In addition, I am personally gratified that the discovery we made in 1996 with late Dr. Antoine Noujaim, and the improvement made in 2017 (U.S. patents 6,241,985 and 10,537,636) formed the basis for the FLORA-5 phase III clinical study," added Dr. Madiyalakan.

About Quest Pharmatech Inc.

Quest Pharmatech is a publicly traded, Canadian-based biopharmaceutical company developing products to improve the quality of life. The company has a 42.5-per-cent ownership interest in OncoQuest Inc., which sold its immunotherapy technology assets to Korea-based Dual Industrial Co. Ltd. in April, 2020. Quest also has a 23-per-cent ownership interest in OncoVent, a Chinese joint venture developing antibody-based immunotherapeutic products for cancer for the greater China territory. Quest is also developing proprietary MAb AR 9.6 targeting truncated MUC16 as theranostic agents for cancer. AR 9.6 was licensed from University of Nebraska and currently is in late preclinical stage.

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