Enteris to work on Sanofi oral type 2 diabetes candidate & metabolic peptide for Nordic Bioscience
Sanofi and Nordic Bioscience deals ‘validate’ oral delivery tech, Enteris
The first deal, announced Monday, will see the New Jersey-based biotech use its proprietary Peptelligence technology to help develop an oral formulation of one of Sanofi’s preclinical stage peptides for Type 2 diabetes.
And today Enteris has announced a clinical manufacturing contract to use the platform to advance the development of a metabolic peptide for Nordic Bioscience subsidiary KeyBioscience AG.
“Being selected by both Sanofi and Nordic is further validation that in our niche market – peptides and small molecules – Peptelligence outperforms our competitors’ technology hands down,” Brian Zietsman, president and CFO of Enteris, told in-Pharmatechnologist.com.
“This is further validation that our platform works. Both companies conducted their own due diligence prior to choosing.”
The work for both projects will be conducted at Enteris’ GMP facilities in Boonton, New Jersey. Financial details were not disclosed.
Peptelligence
Enteris Biopharma acquired the rights to the Peptelligence platform in April 2013 from the now defunct drug delivery tech firm Unigene Laboratories.
The platform includes two functional excipients, placed together with the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) in an enterically coated tablet which keeps the tablet whole as it passes through the stomach.
“After passing through the stomach, the PH level changes which causes the enteric coat to come off and in turn releases the API and our two functional excipients,” Zietsman explained.
“The job of the functional excipients is to increase the solubility and permeability of the API and then through paracellular transport mechanism the API enters into the systemic circulation.”
Diabetes ‘game changer’
Such technology aims to improve the bioavailability of APIs, allowing the oral delivery of small molecules and peptides which currently can only be delivered subcutaneously or intravenously.
“Type 2 diabetes is an area with a lot of focus and attention in recent years and an area where there is certainly a lot of competition,” Zietsman said, of the Sanofi deal.
“Developing an oral formulation for Type 2 diabetes will be a ‘game changer’ in the industry. It therefore goes without saying that developing an oral formulation will be significant for both the company whose technology is utilized as well as for the company that owns the product.”
Sanofi adds to Enteris' growing list of large and small pharma clients, though Nordic Bioscience has previously worked with the firm, being the first company to license the bioavailability tech from Enteris in October 2013.
“In addition to the deals announced this week, we have recently entered into programs with other Pharma companies,” Zietsman told us. “Unfortunately some of those companies would prefer not to announce our collaboration for competitive reasons, at this time.”
