University of California spinout Addition Therapeutics has uncloaked, revealing “breakthrough” PRINT technology it hopes will fuel a new wave of genetic medicine.
Addition emerges from stealth with $100 million from big-name investors including SR One, Pivotal Life Sciences, Abingworth, Osage University Partners, the Gates Foundation and BEVC, according to a Dec. 17 release.
Addition also comes with some big-name leaders. Ron Park, M.D., comes on board as its chief executive, having formerly been CEO of Ambys Medicines and having served a long stint at Roche/Genentech. Francine Gregoire, Ph.D., meanwhile, has worked at a host of cutting-edge biotechs, including Beam, CRISPR and Moderna. She joins as chief scientific officer.
It’s early days for the startup, but its core tech is centered on its all-RNA, nonviral, lipid nanoparticle-based PRINT (Precise RNA Mediated Insertion of Transgenes) platform.
The idea is to create “safer, durable, one-time therapies, overcoming limitations of current genetic medicine modalities,” the biotech said in a Dec. 17 statement.
Details on disease targets are thin on the ground, but Addition says it is seeking to “redefine how chronic and rare diseases are treated.” Initial preclinical work is slated to begin next year.
One area of work Addition has already spotlighted is HIV. Using a Gates Foundation grant, Addition will use one of its so-called PRINTed programs that aim, with a single dose, to allow endogenous production of antibodies to “provide lifetime protection against HIV.”
The biotech said it has also worked on research initiatives “with undisclosed pharmaceutical companies” to help build up its early pipeline.
Addition is a spinout of the lab of Kathleen Collins, Ph.D., at the University of California, Berkeley, where she is a professor and former head of the Division of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Structural Biology.
The tech is based on Collins’ retrotransposase expertise. “While we’ve seen important progress over the last decade, gene therapy modalities approaching or in the clinic are limited in their technical capabilities and restricted in their applicability and adoption,” Collins explained in the release.
“Harnessing retrotransposon machinery to achieve precise transgene insertion to the ideal genomic safe harbor site is an elegant and versatile new drug mechanism,” Collins added. “It’s thrilling to see the Addition team’s evolution of this technology into a powerful platform and a pipeline that has the potential to help usher in a new era of genomic medicines.”