Jounce’s Antibody Misses Primary Endpoint In Phase 2 Lung Cancer Study

Jounce Therapeutics has suffered a setback after its most advanced product candidate, vopratelimab, failed to meet the primary endpoint in the Phase 2 SELECT trial evaluating a combination immunotherapy for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). 

News of the trial miss on Wednesday caused shares in Jounce to fall more than 15%. The company is now trading at less than half of its share price since the start of 2022. 

Failure With A Silver Lining 

SELECT assessed two combination doses of vopratelimab (vopra), an inducible costimulator (ICOS) agonist, and pimivalimab (pimi), a PD-1 checkpoint inhibitor, against pimivalimab monotherapy in immunotherapy naïve, TISvopra biomarker-selected NSCLC patients. 

Vopra is a T cell agonist; the monoclonal antibody binds to ICOS, a protein found on certain T cells, which activates the T cells. 

The study was powered to detect a 20% absolute difference of the pooled combo doses compared to pimi monotherapy. The actual difference was 7%, which meant the trial missed its primary endpoint. 

Interesting trends were observed in the combination dose cohort with the lower dose of vopra, Jounce noted. A dose of 0.03 mg/kg of vopra resulted in a 40% overall response rate compared to 25% in pimi alone, while the six-month progression-free survival (PFS) rate was 80% compared to 33% in pimi alone. 

On the safety front, vopra continued to be well-tolerated, with adverse events comparable to the pimi monotherapy. Most of the side effects were mild to moderate, the company said.

Jounce will re-evaluate the vopra program in the context of its broader pipeline in the coming months, said CEO Richard Murray. 

“We continue to be pleased with pimi’s activity, which supports its continued use in our ongoing and future combination trials. We plan to submit a clinical abstract to present the entire SELECT study, including more mature data, at the ESMO Immuno-Oncology Congress in December 2022,” said Murray. 

Author

Joy Lin

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