Bispecific Antibodies

About HBICE^®

The HCAb Harbour Mice^® platform generates diverse and stable fully human heavy-chain-only antibodies (HCAbs) and derived human VH single-domain moieties, enabling the development of  novel multi-specific and multi-valent antibodies with simplified structures - a relatively smaller molecular size, and fewer polypeptide chains.

Building on this, we have established the proprietary HBICE^® (HCAb-Based Immune Cell Engagers) platform to rapidly develop multi-specific antibodies that redirect immune cells to the tumor microenvironment (TME) for tumor eradication.

HBICE^® molecules recognize and bind specific tumor-associated antigens (TAA) on tumor cells and CD3 or co-stimulatory molecules on immune cells such as T cells or NK cells. This results in efficient and selective immune cell activation within the TME, preventing non-specific activation in peripheral immune cells. Furthermore, HBICE^® technology offers the flexibility to generate molecules with different architectures and avidities, achieving distinct mechanisms of action unattainable with combination therapies.

Exemplary scenarios are depicted in the diagrams below (Figs. 2 and 3). By bypassing the conventional T-cell activation pathway trigged by TCR-MHC interaction, CD3-targeting HBICE^® molecules can elicit a polyclonal T-cell response to overcome immune escape mechanisms such as the downregulation of antigen presentation in a non-MHC restricted fashion (Fig. 2). T cells in the TME are often sub-optimally primed in the absence of co-stimulatory signals. Supplementation with HBICE^® antibodies targeting co-stimulatory molecules results in TAA-mediated clustering of these molecules, activating the downstream pathway. This provides the necessary co-stimulatory signal for full T-cell activation, leading to effective tumor eradication and an improved safety profile (Fig. 3).