BioFocus lifts stake in AustCancer

Australian Cancer Technology's joint venture partner BioFocus has strengthened the alliance between the two companies by increasing its holding to more than three per cent.

Dr Alistair Cowden, managing director of Perth-based AustCancer, said that the share subscription cemented the alliance between the two companies.

"BioFocus realises the value of the research at AustCancer," he said.

This is the second investment into the company by UK-based BioFocus, and Cowden indicated that a third investment is expected to happen later this year.

AustCancer and BioFocus are currently collaborating on two projects, Cowden said. "BioFocus is drug discovery and have no experience in taking products to the market," said Cowden.

He explained that BioFocus did the initial discovery research and AustCancer focussed on taking the drugs to the clinic. "It's a very attractive partnership for them. And it allows AustCancer to access skills not necessarily available in Australia."

The first AustCancer-BioFocus collaboration is for discovery of small molecule drugs capable of blocking the erb2 receptor, which is often present in high numbers on the surface of breast cancer cells.

The erb2 receptor is a target for breast cancer drug Herceptin (developed by Genentech), which has the disadvantage of being a monoclonal antibody.

"We are hoping to discover a small molecule with similar action to Herceptin," Cowden said.

In May, AustCancer announced that it had identified a promising family of compounds capable of acting on the erb2 receptor.

BioFocus is also providing drug discovery services for a second AustCancer project to identify inhibitors for Chk1 kinase, a cause of drug resistance in cancer cells.