NKMAX Announces Interim Phase 1 Results of 'SNK02' in Solid Tumor Patients at US Affiliate ASCO

NKMAX affiliate NKGen Biotech announced on the 24th that it plans to present interim results of the Phase 1 clinical trial on the enhanced cytotoxicity of the allogeneic NK cell therapy (SNK02) at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) conference.

The ASCO conference will be held from the 31st of this month to the 4th of next month (local time) at the McCormick Place Convention Center in Illinois, USA.

This clinical trial is a multicenter open-label study evaluating the safety and tolerability of SNK02 in participants with pathologically confirmed solid tumors who are refractory to standard treatment regimens. SNK02 is an allogeneic non-genetically modified NK cell product with excellent antitumor cytotoxicity and expression rates of CD16, NKG2D, NKp46, and DNAM-1 exceeding 90%, enabling large-scale commercialization. NKGen Biotech administered 6 billion SNK02 cells intravenously (IV) over 8 weeks to five patients with advanced solid tumors.

The company expects that administering SNK02 at high doses allows frequent dosing without lymph node depletion and can demonstrate activity against solid tumors that have failed multiple prior standard treatment options. The primary endpoints were safety based on adverse events (AE) and vital sign assessments, and the tolerability and maximum tolerated dose of SNK02 were also evaluated.

Paul Y. Song, CEO of NKGen Biotech, stated, "Interim data from the Phase 1 clinical trial using SNK02 showed good tolerability as a monotherapy in patients with solid tumors refractory to standard treatments. SNK02 holds great promise as a first-in-class allogeneic NK cell therapy for solid tumors that do not require lymphodepletion prior to administration."

He added, "Especially in future combination therapies with immune checkpoint inhibitors that require strong T cell responses, SNK02 can provide overall better synergistic effects. We are pleased to see promising Phase 1 trial results for two unique cell therapy candidates: the autologous cell therapy SNK01 for neurodegenerative diseases and the allogeneic cell therapy SNK02 for cancer."