Amplia Therapeutics: An oral cancer drug trial with serious results!
Amplia Therapeutics Managing Director Chris Burns on 3AW & 2GB Bulls N' Bears Report
Listen to ASX-listed Amplia Therapeutics Managing Director Chris Burns talk to Matt Birney on the Bulls N’ Bears Report about Amplia’s remarkable drug that looks to be having an impact on a known cancer growth protein.
TO LISTEN TO THE AMPLIA THERAPEUTICS AUDIO INTERVIEW - CLICK BELOW
RADIO INTERVIEW - TRANSCRIPT
Matt Birney - Welcome to Bulls N' Bears brought to you today by cancer drug development company Amplia Therapeutics.
Matt Birney - ASX code: ATX
Matt Birney - I'm Matt Birney and I'm joined now by the Managing Director of Amplia Therapeutics, Chris Burns
Matt Birney - Hi Chris
Chris Burns - Hi Matt
Matt Birney - Okay Chris so Amplia has a clinical trial underway to test your very interesting AMP945 drug designed to inhibit the growth of a particular protein that's often found in cancers and particularly in pancreatic cancer, we'll get to that trial in a minute.
Matt Birney - But firstly without getting too scientific on me, how exactly does AMP945 work?
Chris Burns - So AMP945 is a drug that's taken as a pill unlike a lot of other cancer medications and it's designed to very selectively and potently inhibit this particular protein FAK.
Chris Burns - FAK is involved in cancer cell growth and also the formation of the scar tissue around the tumour that makes actually it much harder for drugs to penetrate and work on those cancers.
Matt Birney - Okay so clinical trial, how many people took part in your trial? How many showed a positive response to AMP945?
Chris Burns - So of the latest trial we've enrolled 26 patients, which is not a lot but we saw already it's early days, we've seen six patients show a significant reduction in their tumour size.
Chris Burns - We've had another six patients show stable disease over time, it's a developing data set but already we're pretty excited about that data and we can now recruit a further 24 patients in the trial to give us a total of 50 patients.
Matt Birney - It looks like you've got the US FDA on side, a Herculean task itself, the FDA has just granted fast track designation for this drug, what advantages come with that?
Chris Burns - Well most importantly it's expedited review of any documentation we put up to the FDA and that's it's really a thing about time isn't it turn things around quickly but also an improved interaction in general with the FDA.
Chris Burns - They answer our emails, they answer our phone calls so they've been great.
Matt Birney - How big is the market for a drug like AMP945? Do you have any numbers around the global annual spend on pancreatic cancer in particular?
Chris Burns - Yes, look in 2023 it's estimated there was about 6 billion, that's with a B, spent around the world on medication for pancreatic cancer. We know that market size is growing because unfortunately pancreatic cancer is increasing around the world.
Matt Birney - I note Amplia's share price is up about 80 per cent so the market seems to like it.
Matt Birney - Chris Burns from Amplia Therapeutics
Matt Birney - Thanks for joining me on Bulls N' Bears and remember we're only here to give you information, not advice, which you should of course seek independently.
Matt Birney - I'm Matt Birney and this is Bulls N' Bears
Outro - For more public company interviews go to the money page on the 6PR, 2GB, 3AW and 4BC websites and click the public companies tab.