Oxford BioDynamics losses widen in first half

Biotechnology company Oxford BioDynamics reported a fall in revenue to £0.2m in its interim results on Tuesday, from £0.6m a year earlier.

The AIM-traded firm said its operating loss widened to £2.4m for the six months ended 31 March, from £1.7m in the first half of 2019.

It said its cash and term deposits totalled £13.9m at period end, down from £16.9m at the same time 12 months prior, and £15.5m at the end of the 2019 financial year.

On the corporate front, Oxford BioDynamics noted its board restructuring during the year to support its future growth worldwide, with a special focus on the United States, as it appointed Dr Jon Burrows as global chief executive officer in March.

It also presented “significant” results of the utility of its ‘EpiSwitch’ product in predicting response to immuno-oncology treatments, co-authored with Pfizer, EMD Serono and Mayo Clinic, offering significant commercial potential, in November.

The company signed a master services agreement with an unnamed “top” US pharmaceutical company in December.

Its board highlighted the publication in the peer-reviewed Translational Medicine Communications of the development of the first successful blood-based assay for prognostic stratification and disease subtyping in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), in collaboration with Roche and Genentech, in March.

The first patient was recruited to the Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma America (MTPA)-sponsored ‘REFINE-ALS’ clinical study in October, in which EpiSwitch biomarkers were used to assess the rate of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) disease progression.

Professor Iain McInnes was also appointed to the company's scientific advisory board in October.

Since the period ended, Oxford BioDynamics noted the inclusion of its EpiSwitch technology in the ‘GETAFIX’ clinical study, in collaboration with the University of Glasgow, to perform prognostic and predictive profiling of Covid-19 patients in April.

It also received the first 500 samples under the master services agreement with the US pharmaceutical company in April.

The group's chief scientific officer Dr Alexandre Akoulitchev was appointed to represent the firm on the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (FNIH) Biomarkers Consortium Steering Committees in Oncology, Inflammation & Immunity, and Neuroscience in Bethesda, Maryland in April.

Industry expert Dr Peter Pack was appointed as independent non-executive chairman in June, succeeding Stephen Diggle.

“By reducing to practice and presenting the utility of our IO non-response EpiSwitch classifier at SITC in November, followed by the commercially validating execution of a master services agreement with one of the industry's leading pharma companies in December to use the EpiSwitch platform for biomarker development, it is clear that Oxford BioDynamics is beginning to put itself firmly on the map as an innovative value adding technology company to partner with for pharma drug development and precision medicine,” said chief executive officer Jon Burrows.

“The completion and publication of our work in DLBCL with Roche and Genentech and our participation in the REFINE-ALS clinical trial with Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma America are further evidence of our early reach into the commercial space.

“Finally, the turn in a commercially dedicated direction has been completed by the appointments of a commercially seasoned global CEO and chairman to lead the company through the effects of Covid-19 and into the commercial opportunities of 2021.”

At 1157 BST, shares in Oxford BioDynamics were down 0.57% at 63.14p.