Sanofi announces partnership to develop new class of oncology therapeutics

Sanofi has announced it is partnering with IGM Biosciences on a new technology platform to discover agonists for oncology, immunology and inflammation targets.

The collaboration will enable the companies to create, develop, manufacture and commercialize a new class of potential therapeutics. They will combine the features of IgM antibodies over conventional IgG antibodies for stimulating cell surface receptors.

This is significant because IgM antibodies contain a number of structural differences that can give them significant advantages compared to IgG antibodies, particularly when it comes to targeting cancers.

Targeting cancer cells

A spokesperson for Sanofi told Pharma IQ: “From an oncology perspective, formatting antibodies into IgM molecules efficiently creates the geometry necessary to activate certain types of cell surface receptors. The better activation will increase the likelihood of translating into better clinical efficacy. [The] IgG format currently does not provide the correct scaffold to achieve this efficient activation.”

IgMs are one of the five natural classes of antibodies, while IgGs are the basis for nearly all of the therapeutic drugs that are in the market today. Speaking to Pharma IQ, Fred Schwarzer, CEO of IGM Biosciences, explained further: “You can think of an IgM, in very rough terms, as five IgGs arranged in a pizza-like structure.”

“If you take the sixth slice of the pizza out, that is where a linking protein called the joining chain, or the J chain, converts the IgM into a pentamer,” he added. “An IgM antibody has 10 binding units compared to two binding units for an IgG antibody and that gives the IgM antibody a strong advantage in total binding power.”

First-of-its-kind therapeutics

Having 10 binding sites enables the IgM antibody to connect to multiple cell-surface receptors simultaneously, potentially increasing the signal that can be generated and creating a biological response.

“We are using this feature in our DR5 agonist IGM-8444, which is currently in Phase 1 trials in oncology,” Schwarzer said. “This ability of IgM antibodies to agonize or stimulate targets is the scientific basis of our collaboration with Sanofi.”

IGM Biosciences is also studying IgM antibodies in Phase 2 trials for non-Hodgkins lymphoma.

“To the best of our knowledge, we are the only people in the world who can make IgM antibodies at scale and at high quality,” Schwarzer added. “We believe we are also the only significant effort anywhere in biotech or pharma that focuses on IgM antibodies.”

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