Abstract 3833: SEA-BCMA: A highly active enhanced antibody for multiple myeloma

Abstract

Abstract Despite a number of new therapies for multiple myeloma (MM) most patients relapse, require multiple lines of therapy, and ultimately succumb to disease. Therapies that are well tolerated and active remain an unmet need. Currently, successful MM therapies combine agents with different mechanisms of action and safety profiles. Therapeutic antibodies have recently altered the MM treatment paradigm, allowing patients to achieve deeper responses with minimal added toxicity. SEA-BCMA is a humanized afucosylated IgG1 antibody targeting BCMA, which shows preclinical evidence of encouraging activity and tolerability. BCMA is expressed at the surface of plasma cells, and induces proliferative signals through the binding of its ligands APRIL and BAFF. SEA-BCMA acts through three mechanisms of action. One, it engages in increased binding to FcγRIII through SEA technology leading to enhanced antibody dependent cellular cytotoxicity. Two, it mediates antibody dependent cellular phagocytosis. Three, it blocks the proliferative signals from BCMA ligand binding. This antibody shows activity in all seven tumor xenograft models tested, inducing tumor delays at doses as low as 0.1mg/kg, and generating prolonged survival and durable regressions with repeat dosing. SEA-BCMA is active on tumor xenografts expressing as few as 2000 surface copies of BCMA antigen. Both effector function and ligand blocking contribute to overall in vivo activity. In the absence of effector cell recruitment, ligand blocking alone can induce prolonged durable regressions. In addition, SEA-BCMA can target MM cells in the presence of soluble BCMA. SEA-BCMA is tolerated up to 100mg/kg in cynomolgus monkey, reflecting lack of toxicity from cellular interactions with the Fc portion of the Ab, since SEA-BCMA does not bind to the cynomolgus monkey antigen. SEA-BCMA displays a 12-day half-life in these animals. In vitro testing with human PBMCs or bone marrow mononuclear cells induced minimal cytokine production in the presence of BCMA target. In summary, SEA-BCMA is highly active and well tolerated in preclinical models and is a strong candidate for treatment of MM patients. Citation Format: Heather Van Epps, Martha Anderson, Changpu Yu, Kerry Klussman, Lori Westendorf, Chris Carosino, Luke Manlove, Julia Cochran, Jason Neale, Dennis Benjamin, Maureen Ryan. SEA-BCMA: A highly active enhanced antibody for multiple myeloma [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2018; 2018 Apr 14-18; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2018;78(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 3833.