
Ascendo Biotechnology Inc.
Pavilion:
National Biotechnology Research Park (Resident company)
Industry:
Pharmaceutical, Small molecule drugs
About
Ascendo was established in October 2018. It is an offshore company registered in the Cayman Islands, U.K., and a start-up focusing on using translational sciences as its core energy to develop new drugs in immunotherapy. Ascendo has a first-in-class novel monoclonal antibody drug ASD141 that targets cancers and infections. It also has an unique therapeutic/preventive vaccine platform - ASD25X.
ASD141, acts on innate immunity checkpoints and activates innate immunity. ASD141 was proven to be capable of producing pre-existing immunity in animal tests. It can turn tumor microenvironment from cold tumor to hot tumor, hence, greatly increase the efficacy of current marketed immune checkpoint inhibitors.
ASD25X can produce humoral immunity- immunoglobulin and cellular immunity – cytotoxic T cells, simultaneously; therefore, it is highly suitable to develop vaccine for therapeutic purpose. Due to COVID-19 pandemic, Ascendo developed subunit protein of COVID-19 prevention vaccine. It successfully passed the challenge testing with live COVID-19 viruses in an animal model and all the vaccinated animals have 100% immunoprotection, and there was no virus alive and remained in their lung tissues. With its simple manufacturing
process that may substantially reduce costs, the vaccine can achieve high-speed mass production. We plan to enter the clinical trial in 2021 to prove a protective effect in humans and reach the global, pandemic prevention goal.
