Curocell is a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing CAR-T therapies for the treatment of Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma (DLBCL), which is known for its high recurrence and drug resistance. The company's CAR-T therapy, Anvalcel, demonstrated superior results in Phase 2 clinical trials, achieving a 67.1% complete response rate and a 75.3% objective response rate, outperforming competitors. Additionally, it showed lower rates of side effects, indicating excellent safety. Curocell has established a GMP facility, reducing the manufacturing time from 40 days to just 14 days, enabling rapid supply of the therapy. The company aims to commercialize the first CAR-T therapy in Korea.

OVIS™ Platform technology is Curocell’s proprietary platform technology designed to get away from exhaustion induced by immune checkpoint receptors. Exhaustion induced by immune checkpoint receptors was considered as one of the limitations of conventional CAR-T therapy. Various strategies avoiding immune suppression are being researched, and the idea of OVIS CAR-T technology came from merging functions of immune checkpoint receptor blockade and CAR-T together. OVIS CAR-T cassette enables simultaneous expression of CAR and downregulation of immune checkpoint receptors. Curocell’s optimal combination of immune checkpoint receptors to be downregulated was PD-1 and TIGIT. Anti-cancer efficacy was improved by downregulation of PD-1 and TIGIT in CAR-T cells. The beauty of OVIS platform technology is that it is applicable to any CAR-T regardless of target changes and as well as to types of immune cell therapies. PD-1 and TIGIT downregulation grants OVIS CAR-T cells differentiated characteristics. Improved cell proliferation and keeping CAR-T cell less differentiated synergistically enhances anti-tumor activity of CAR-T cells.

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