Lyell Immunopharma to acquire ImmPACT Bio

California, USA-based Lyell Immunopharma (Nasdaq: LYEL) has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire privately-held US CAR-T company ImmPACT Bio, with the news sending its shares down 15% to $0.93.

ImmPACT’s lead program is IMPT-314, a CD19/20-targeting chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell product candidate that Lyell will continue to develop for hematologic malignancies, including large B-cell lymphoma. IMPT-314 was designed to outperform the efficacy of approved CD19 CAR T-cell therapies via a dual-targeting CAR T-cell design and to improve CAR T-cell persistence by enriching for naïve and central memory T cells during manufacturing, the company explained.

The acquisition of ImmPACT is expected to significantly strengthen Lyell’s clinical-stage pipeline of next- generation CAR T-cell therapies and complement its suite of proprietary technologies designed to generate longer-lasting, functional T cells to achieve more durable outcomes for patients with solid tumors and hematologic malignancies.