STM418, a potential best-in-class PD-1 antibody owned by STCube, exerts its anticancer efficacy by specifically masking a glycosylation site on PD-1 shown to be critical to PD-1’s binding to PD-L1.  STM418 is reported to show a higher affinity to PD-1 than certain marketed PD-1 antibodies approved by U.S. FDA, and exhibits a strong anticancer efficacy by significantly inhibiting PD-1/PD-L1 interaction.

In particular, animal experiments showed that STM418 showed superior efficacies in reduction of tumor growth and lengthening the survival period than some of the marketed PD-1 antibodies.

Further research on STM418 is currently on-going by STCube, in collaboration with renowned medical institutions overseas.

Market for immune-checkpoint inhibitors keeps growing – for example, annual sales for Keytruda®, a well-known U.S. FDA approved immune-checkpoint antibody drug, reached 13 billion U.S. dollars in 2019.  The company expects that STM418, which shows promising results and has potential to become best-in-class new drug, can be a game changer once it successfully obtains regulatory approval.

The company states that “based on favorable preclinical results,” it is “putting in significant efforts to develop STM418 into a superior immunotherapy than already marketed drugs such as Keytruda® and Opdivo®.”  The company “is moving forward with manufacturing of STM418, and plans to proceed into clinical investigation on the drug.” <End>