WuXi Biologics launches bispecific antibody tech

WuXi Biologics says it can expedite the development of bispecific antibodies by up to 18 months compared to current offerings through its new ‘WuXiBody’ platform.

The Chinese contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) WuXi Biologics announced the additional service offering during its 2018 interim results and said its proprietary tech can potentially transform the bispecific industry.

“We can take any two sequences of the MAbs [monoclonal antibodies] and engineer into WuXiBody bispecific in two to three months. The resulting bispecifics express well, do not form aggregates and do not mispair,” CEO Chris Chen told BioProcess Insider.

This is six to 18 months quicker than current bispecific services due to addressing limitations of other platforms, Chen added, and will reduce the manufacturing costs associated with bispecific MAbs.

“One of main limitations of current platform is manufacturing related issues: low expression, high aggregate and high homodimer. We want to address these issues.”

Financial details have not been divulged, but we were told the platform it does not require significantly investment.

“A staff of 10 can handle 40 to 50 projects,” said Chen, adding the CDMO is already in discussion with multiple clients.

WuXi applied to trademark the name ‘WuXiBody’ in December last year. It was approved on July 24.

Cell line development

The move into bispecifics follows WuXi’s recent investment in both its biomanufacturing capacity (see here and here) and a move into cell line development, through its WuXia platform.

The mammalian cell line development capabilities are for a wide variety of antibody and protein therapeutics and according to the firm it has enabled the start of more than 60 IND-enabling projects per year, “one of the largest capacities in the world.”

For the first half 2018, the CDMO reported sales of RMB1.05 billion (US$153 million), up 61% on the same period last year. Net profit stood at RMB250 million, up 171% on the first half 2017.