Blackstone Life Sciences has committed $250 million towards the launch of a new autologous and allogeneic universal chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy company, along with Intellia Therapeutics and Cellex Cell Professionals.
The new company will combine clinical-stage universal CAR-T platforms from GEMoaB, a subsidiary of Cellex, with Intellia’s differentiated allogeneic cell platform and CRISPR cell engineering.
Massachusetts-based Intellia Therapeutics is a clinical stage genome editing company focused on developing curative therapeutics using CRISPR/Cas9 technology. Germany-based GEMoaB is focused on the development of next-generation immunotherapies and cell therapies for hard-to-treat cancers.
According to Andrew Schiermeier, current CEO of Intellia, who will become the CEO of the newly formed company, "the launch represents the first of many steps to addressing the various limitations that currently exist in the cell therapy space." The new company's focus will be on providing safer and more efficacious treatments to patients who are suffering from hard-to-treat cancers and autoimmune diseases.
The new company will be headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts and will acquire GEMoaB with established offices and labs in Dresden, Germany.
Read the press release