Concarlo announced that US Patent 10,702,570 was issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for a metastatic breast cancer treatment. The patent, for which Concarlo is the exclusive licensee, covers IpY, a novel therapeutic peptide that addresses drug-resistant breast cancer by targeting a unique cellular pathway — p27Kip1. Concarlo has also announced that a new provisional patent application has been filed for modified versions of the therapeutic peptide that are believed to exhibit enhanced bioavailability. Concarlo is a Brooklyn-based biotechnology innovator dedicated to developing sophisticated, targeted therapies and diagnostics in the oncology space. The IpY technology is the first to address the high incidence of drug-refractory disease that develops with currently available CDK4 inhibitor (CDK4i) treatments. Such a solution has the potential to drastically increase overall survival of breast cancer patients.

With more than 40,000 deaths due to metastatic breast cancer estimated for this year alone in the US, there is a pressing need to bring newer, more effective therapeutics to market. The recent introduction of CDK4i drugs, a class of medicines that directly targets the CDK4/6 pathway implicated in many malignancies, has had a significant impact on the way in which the disease is managed. However, such therapeutics are associated with patients transitioning to a treatment-resistant form of the condition, despite initial extended periods of remission. Backed by more than 20 years of research and development expertise, Concarlo has developed IpY and a companion diagnostic, ApY, to effectively overcome the issue of CDK4i resistance and roll out a more targeted treatment approach for optimized patient outcomes.

“Despite the clinical efficacy of CDK4 inhibitors, we’re seeing that primary or secondary resistance to therapy is presenting a significant challenge to overall survival,” commented Dr. Dominique Bridon, Chief Development Officer at Concarlo. “With the IpY technology and its unique mechanism of action, we’re effectively targeting CDK4 while simultaneously inhibiting another target — CDK2 — which has been found to be a key molecular player in the development of drug resistance. In doing so, we are the first company to successfully address the CDK4i resistance issue to provide long-term durable tumor arrest. Combined with its highly specific targeting and low toxicity profile, the positive impact of this drug on the breast cancer treatment landscape is hard to understate.”