[Asia Economy Reporter Hyunseok Yoo] Hyundai Bio is showing strong performance. It appears that the expectation that its major shareholder, C&Pharm, will develop a treatment for the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19) is influencing the stock price. The global signs of COVID-19 resurgence and the rapid increase in market capitalization of treatment developers are also interpreted as factors affecting investor sentiment. Shinpoong Pharmaceutical has continued its rapid rally, soaring 840% since the beginning of this year. Its market capitalization surpassed 3.6 trillion KRW.
As of 9:22 AM on the 14th, Hyundai Bio was trading at 13,000 KRW, up 8.33% (1,000 KRW) from the previous trading day.
Hyundai Bio announced on the 14th that its major shareholder, C&Pharm, confirmed that its second pain-free anticancer drug 'Polyplatin', developed using its advanced drug delivery system (DDS), reduced toxicity by 91% compared to cisplatin, a platinum-based anticancer drug, in toxicity comparison cell experiments.
The platinum-based drug 'cisplatin' is noted for its excellent virus replication blocking function and is regarded as a promising treatment for COVID-19 if the cytotoxicity issue can be resolved. Polyplatin is an advanced new drug substance processed with C&Pharm's DDS and toxicity control technology applied to cisplatin.
C&Pharm explained that in cell experiments measuring cell viability, which indicates the degree of intracellular toxicity expression, cisplatin showed 17.9 micromolar (uM), whereas 'Polyplatin' recorded about 11 times higher at 189.9 micromolar (uM). This means that Polyplatin, which contains cisplatin as the base drug, reduced toxicity by 91% compared to cisplatin.
Platinum-based anticancer drugs have high RNA selectivity, with the American Chemical Society (ACS) publishing in its journal that their binding affinity to RNA is up to 20 times greater than to DNA. Therefore, it is expected that by binding to the RNA of the COVID-19 virus, these drugs can block viral RNA replication and thus have a therapeutic effect against COVID-19.
C&Pharm plans to immediately enter preclinical trials to use Polyplatin, developed as a low-toxicity anticancer drug, as a COVID-19 treatment similar to Polytaxel, while also exploring the possibility of pursuing fast track procedures.
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