Funding for Simmunext New therapy for cancer treatment

Simmunext Biotherapeutics BV, a spinoff company from Radboudumc, Radboud University and Oncode Institute, is now set to advance its development of an innovative cancer therapy with a boost from the Early Phase Financing Fund Gelderland (VFF Gelderland). The investment will facilitate further research into the treatment’s efficacy and potential.

Simmunext's groundbreaking therapy aims to enhance the body's immune response against cancer cells through use of novel synthetic biopolymers which replicate the body’s immune presenting cells, in order to activate T cells, the cells which target and kill specific foreign cells in the body, such as tumor cells. Spearheaded by Oncode Investigator Carl Figdor, the treatment focuses on using Simmunext’s biopolymer to activate T cells against specific tumor cells.

While Simmunext’s platform technology can be used like conventional methods to activate T-cells outside the body, the power of Simmunext's approach is the ability to be used internally to activate T cells within the patient, which could prove hugely effective and logistically advantageous, as such an in vivo therapy would shorten the time for patients to receive treatment – receiving the Simmunext therapy versus requiring a patients T cells to be isolated, sent to an external facility for processing and then sent back to the hospital for reinfusion into the patient, a time- and cost-intensive process. 

With the VFF Gelderland funding, Simmunext can work on demonstrating the viability of its approach, a step closer to a more effective and accessible treatment for cancer patients.

Source: https://www.oncode.nl/news/simmunext-biotherapeutics-bv-receives-further-funding