Boan Biotech obtains regulatory approval for their LY-CovMab antibody clinical program using Horizon Discovery’s CHOSOURCE™ CHO-K1 GS Knockout expression platform

Horizon Discovery is pleased to share that Shandong Boan Biotechnology Co. Ltd. (Boan Biotech) a fully integrated biopharmaceutical company specializing in therapeutic antibody development with a focus on oncology, immunology, pain, and endocrine diseases has obtained approval by the Center for Drug Evaluation of the China National Medical Products Administration to initiate clinical trials for their antibody product LY-CovMab for prevention and treatment of COVID-19, The company will use Horizon’s CHOSOURCE CHO-K1 GS Knockout expression platform for development and commercialization for this program.

Boan Biotech recently acquired a license to use Horizon’s proprietary CHOSOURCE expression platform with Boan managing to obtain clinical trials approval for its first therapeutic candidate as a company only a few months after closing a license with Horizon. This success is testimony of Boan Biotech’s entrepreneurship and expertise in antibody discovery work and underlines CHOSOURCE’s ability to deliver results under demanding timelines. Boan Biotech has developed more than 10 innovative antibody product candidates with international intellectual property protection, and eight biosimilar products. CHOSOURCE has a successful track record in the discovery and development of biopharmaceuticals; from applications in transient expression during research and early development to the generation of stable cell lines for clinical and commercial cGMP production of biotherapeutics. These include traditional monoclonal antibodies as well as fusion proteins, novel multi-specific antibodies and complex molecular architectures and scaffolds. Horizon licenses its CHOSOURCE expression platform to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and biosimilar companies, as well as contract manufacturing organizations. To date, CHOSOURCE has been licensed to over 80 organizations globally, with 10 confirmed investigational new drug (IND) filings for biotherapeutics expressed in these cells since the platform’s launch in 2016.

Dr. Dou Changlin, R&D President and Chief Operating Officer of Boan Biotech explained: “Horizon’s CHOSOURCE cell line combined with our own vector technology is a robust platform for generating high protein expression stable cell lines to support our antibody product development through commercial manufacturing. We are pleased with current program results and move to further collaborate with Horizon Discovery Group.”

“We are extremely excited about Boan Biotech’s first clinical trial approval using Horizon’s CHOSOURCE cell line. Boan Biotech is a highly innovative biopharmaceutical company actively working on faster approaches to develop therapeutic products, and we are pleased that they managed to achieve this milestone in such a short time using our CHOSOURCE expression platform. We believe this further proves the flexibility and robustness of our expression platform to serve the development needs of our customers,” commented Jesús Zurdo, Global Head Cell, Gene Therapy & Bioproduction, Horizon Discovery. “Horizon is fully committed to enable innovative organizations of all sizes, from non-for-profit and early-stage startups to clinical stage biotechnology and large pharmaceutical companies, in their journey to develop much needed novel therapeutic products using our expression platform.”

For further information on Horizon’s CHOSOURCE CHO-K1 GS knockout expression platform and how we can support your developments of biotherapeutic patient therapies please visit:https://horizondiscovery.com/en/chosource