Hummingbird targets antibody discovery hurdle in fighting cancer

Singapore

ANTIBODIES is the buzzword in the race to cure cancer. Naturally produced by our immune systems, they can be used as drugs to bind to target proteins and invoke certain effects, such as destroying cancer cells.

But the industry bottleneck is that once researchers identify a good target protein, it is difficult to find the right antibodies to act against it.

Singapore-based Hummingbird Bioscience is zeroing in on this problem with its proprietary Rational Antibody Discovery (RAD) platform, which enables the startup to identify and "make very potent antibodies that other technologies have been unable to effectively hit", CEO Piers Ingram told The Business Times.

"It's like creating a smart bomb - smart in knowing where to hit and smart in the design of the bomb itself," added Chik Wai Chiew, CEO of Heritas Capital Management, which tracked Hummingbird for two years before backing it earlier this year.

Hummingbird is now conducting pre-clinical studies for two antibodies it has identified, one that acts against the HER3 protein and the other against the VISTA protein. The HER3 protein is associated with conditions such as lung, gastric and colorectal cancer, and VISTA with liver cancer and certain types of breast cancer and lymphoma.

The startup is targeting an Investigational New Drug (IND) application with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the anti-HER3 drug in Q2 2020, and for anti-VISTA one in Q3 2020.

As with any biotech venture, the journey will be arduous. But Hummingbird is armed with fresh capital. On Thursday, the startup announced a US$19 million Series B fundraise co-led by South Korea's Mirae Asset Venture Investment and GNTech Venture Capital.

To date, Hummingbird has secured over US$60 million through financing and strategic partnerships. Its existing investors, Heritas and SEEDS Capital, the investment arm of Enterprise Singapore, also joined the latest round after backing its extended Series A round earlier this year.

New investors in the Series B round include Delian Capital, Mirae Asset Capital, DAValue-GiltEdge, HB Investment, Wooshin Venture Investment and Kiwoom Investment-Shinhan Capital.

Hummingbird has also caught industry attention, partnering Cancer Research UK in August. The charity will fund Hummingbird's development of the anti-HER3 drug, manufacture the clinical-grade antibody and conduct a phase I clinical trial. In September, the startup teamed up with biotech giant Amgen to co-discover antibodies using the RAD platform.

Hummingbird was started in 2015 by Dr Ingram, who is trained in systems biology, and Jerome Boyd-Kirkup, the startup's chief scientific officer. The duo met at an Imperial College alumni drinks event in Shanghai, where Dr Ingram was a management consultant, and Dr Boyd-Kirkup a fellow at the Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute of Computational Biology.

"The majority of the people in the room were finance people, so the two biologists in the room started chatting," Dr Ingram recalled with a laugh. "We discovered that we had a shared interest in systems biology and believed that there was an incredible potential to apply this technology to drug discovery."

Competition is stiff, with other players in the US developing similar antibody discovery platforms. So speed is of essence. "We are competing with incredibly well-resourced companies. Having the team and equipment is expensive," Dr Ingram acknowledges.

In the long haul, a public listing might be an option when Hummingbird has the clinical proof-of-concept data and achieves a breakthrough in cancer drug development. It could take about three to five years for this data to be collected and evaluated.

Not many venture firms would back biotech, given the long gestation, but Heritas' Mr Chik is focused on nurturing biotech unicorns in Singapore. And he is optimistic about Hummingbird's ability to soar high.

"We, together with SEEDS Capital, are pleased to continue backing a leading Singapore-based biotech player as they maintain their focus in creating more effective cancer therapeutics for patients with limited treatment options," he said.

HUMMINGBIRD AT A GLANCE

Founders: Dr Piers Ingram and Dr Jerome Boyd-Kirkup

Business: Using systems biology to generate therapeutic antibodies for precision medicine

HQ: Singapore

Key backers: Decheng Capital (Series A, extended Series A), Heritas and SEEDS Capital (extended Series A, Series B), Mirae Asset Venture Investment and GNTech (Series B)

Funding: US$19 million (Series B) (previous rounds undisclosed)