Crossbow Therapeutics, a cancer drugmaker developing next-generation T cell engagers, announced Wednesday it raised $77 million in a Series B round to continue studying its lead drug in the clinic.
T cell engagers have become a popular investment for drugmakers and venture capitalists, who view them as an alternative to cell therapies for cancer, which can be expensive to manufacture and less convenient to administer.
Several, including Johnson & Johnson’s Tecvayli and Darzalex and Amgen’s Imdelltra, have already been approved to treat various hematological cancers and solid tumors. But marketed T cell engagers carry a risk of immune-related side effects that can lead to serious illness or death.
That’s spurred companies like Crossbow to experiment with new medicines that minimize those side effects. Crossbow’s technology uses antibodies that mimic T cell receptors to prompt immune cells to attack cancer cells, looking for a fragment of a protein only found on the surface of those leukemic cells. Its lead drug, called “CBX-250,” was developed with the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.
In preclinical studies of CBX-250, which will be presented at an upcoming medical meeting in April, Crossbow found that CBX-250 enabled “robust killing of tumor cells” while minimizing damage to healthy cells.
Crossbow is now recruiting participants for a Phase 1 trial of its drug, with early data expected by the end of 2026. Its early study includes patients with acute myeloid leukemia, chronic myeloid leukemia, myelodysplastic syndromes or chronic myelomonocytic leukemia.
“This financing not only strengthens our ability to advance CBX-250 through clinical development but also accelerates our mission to bring next-generation TCR-mimetic immunotherapies to patients who urgently need new options,” said Briggs Morrison, Crossbow’s CEO, in a statement.
Behind its lead drug is another bispecific dubbed “CBX-663” being developed for various blood cancers and solid tumors. CBX-663 goes after a protein called telomerase reverse transcriptase, which is found in 95% of cancers, according to Crossbow. Like Crossbody's lead drug, CBX-663 seeks out a peptide on the surface of cancer cells and directs T cells to attack them.
The Series B round was co-led by Taiho Ventures and Arkin BioCapital, and included 11 other investors such as MPM BioImpact, Pfizer Ventures and Polaris Partners.
