FTM, I've posted below a comment by "Biomaven," who I consider to be one of the top biotech investors and experts I know. He responded to North4000's request to listen to Dr. Thorpe's presentation, and his comments below precipitated some good discussion of Bavi on the Biotech Values Board. I think they are worth reading, although it is evident, as he says, that he has not fully investigated the Bavi story:
biomaven0 Member Profile biomaven0 Member Level
Saturday, August 11, 2012 3:11:56 PM
Re: north40000 post# 146923
Post # of 146987
I just listened to Thorpe's presentation. One caveat here is that this presentation is all I know about the program - I've never actually followed the company. The second caveat is that you would need to be an immunologist to properly judge parts of his presentation and I am very far from being an immunologist.
The presentation covered three things - a proposed MOA, some animal data and some discussion of the clinical trial results to date.
On the proposed MOA, it certainly is interesting. But what makes it unusual and complex is that he is proposing a dual MOA - both an anti-angiogenic initial action and a subsequent immune action. So that in my view makes their path harder, because the MOA is both novel and complex. Any novel MOA starts out with some strikes against it - mostly they don't pan out. The dual activity is also going to make things harder - perhaps one arm will work out in practice but not the other.
The animal data seems fairly convincing, but you have to understand the limits of these models, particularly where any sort of immune pathway is at issue. All these xenograft models are limited because they don't properly reflect the interactions between the tumor and the host. That is doubly so when you are talking any sort of immune pathway.
Finally, the clinical data he presented. It seemed strange the large number of single arm studies they have done. On the one blinded study in NSCLC, it basically seemed negative based on central review of responses. There is of course some chance that the survival data will be favorable, but likely this would likely rely on the immune system MOA. In general anti-angiogenic agents do the opposite - they give a good response but don't prolong survival at all. (Likely because they encourage the survival of tumor stem cells).
So bottom line that makes this trial outcome very risky in my mind - not something I would be tempted to play myself. No reflection on Dr Thorpe who seems to be an excellent basic scientist and presenter from what I could judge.
Peter
AI
