BerGenBio ASA announced that it has entered into a clinical trial agreement with the Mays Cancer Center at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UT Health San Antonio) and Swedish Orphan Biovitrum AB. The parties will collaborate to study BerGenBio's selective AXL inhibitor, bemcentinib, in combination with Sobi's pacritinib in patients with advanced lung adenocarcinoma. The clinical study is externally funded and is complementary to BerGenBio's ongoing Ph1b/2a clinical study in first-line Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer patients with mutations in the STK11 gene.

Bemcentinib is a first-in-class, selective, oral once-a-day inhibitor of AXL receptor tyrosine kinase, a promising therapeutic target for serious diseases. Pacritinib (marketed as VONJO®) is a JAK2 inhibitor indicated for treatment of myelofibrosis, a bone marrow disorder, and works by blocking certain growth factors and cytokines. The clinical study will advance the ground-breaking work of Josephine A. Taverna, MD, a thoracic oncologist at the Mays Cancer Center and Assistant Professor in the Division of Hematology and Oncology at UT Health San Antonio.

Dr. Taverna's prior research has demonstrated that AXL and JAK-STAT3 work together to transmit signals that promote tumor growth and metastasis in advanced lung cancer. The study will be performed in collaboration with Sobi® and will be led by Dr. Taverna as the principal investigator and is funded by a grant received from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).