Crown Bioscience Announces U.S. Expansion With New Translational Oncology Center

Crown Bioscience, Inc. has announced the opening of the Crown Bioscience US Research Center to be located at the David H. Murdock Research Institute (DHMRI), in Kannapolis, NC. The new center, which will open in the 3rd quarter of 2014, represents significant US market expansion for Crown.

The newly established center will combine Crown’s existing cardiovascular and metabolic disease (CVMD) services with a new US expansion of Crown oncology services. Crown’s CVMD business features several in vivo models including a unique collection of spontaneously diabetic monkeys. The addition of Crown oncology services will provide US-based pharmaceutical and biotechnology clients’ access to Crown’s distinctive collection of immune-oncology models. These include Western patient-derived xenografts in humanised mice, murine tumour models raised in an immunocompetent environment (including syngenic cell line derived allografts), GEMM and autografts of spontaneous mouse tumors (MuPrime). The center will enable US-based pharmaceutical and biotech partners to improve the selection and development path for promising clinical candidates; reducing drug development costs. The center at the Kannapolis site will also take advantage of state of the art immunology technologies, including flow cytometry and immunoassays, available at DHMRI, and will also be able to access unique mouse strains available in the US.

Dr Jean-Pierre Wery, President of Crown Bioscience, commented: “The opening of a new center at DHMRI marks an important milestone for Crown. In addition to increasing our capacity for running Western patient derived PDX studies and trials, it presents the opportunity to expand and develop our new immunotherapeutic translational technology platforms. Mouse tumor models with functional murine immunity, including newly created autografts of spontaneous murine tumors (MuPrime), will be available at the center and will support the strong need for new models to help drive immune therapy research forward. Relevant preclinical models to recapitulate clinical treatments are desperately needed and the Research Center will provide partners with a range of immunotherapy research platforms for preclinical drug development, including platforms of mouse and human immunity.”

He continued: “The new research center will be split into two business units for oncology and CVMD, with both areas of the business set to experience significant expansion. The facilities available to us at the DHMRI are excellent, and will greatly benefit our work in translational research across oncology and metabolic disease. We are looking forward to opening the center this year, and building a long-standing relationship with the DHMRI.”

Benjamin Machon, Business Development Director at the DHMRI, commented: “We are excited about extending our relationship with Crown Bioscience beyond metabolic disease into the oncology market; particularly immune-oncology. Crown and its customers can take advantage of the state-of-the-art facilities and the breadth of analytical capabilities available at the Institute. This is a great opportunity for both organisations, and we look forward to working together.”