Lifordi Focuses on Autoimmune Diseases --- Biotech companies are using antibodies to precisely target drugs in the body

 

“Startup Lifordi Immunotherapeutics aims to bring a potent class of cancer treatments to patients with autoimmune diseases, the fruit of decades of research into combining antibodies and drugs.

 

Antibody-drug conjugates are one of the hottest types of oncology therapies because of their guided-missile quality: An antibody homes in on tumor cells and delivers a toxic drug to them, concentrating the treatment where it is needed and reducing harm to healthy tissue.

 

The Food and Drug Administration has approved more than a dozen such treatments, with most approvals coming in recent years.

 

Now, Lifordi and other companies seek to apply antibody-drug conjugates to diseases beyond cancer.

 

Publicly traded AC Immune, for example, is exploring their potential to inhibit protein aggregation in neurodegenerative diseases, according to co-founder and Chief Executive Andrea Pfeifer.

 

"If this works, it could be one of the major innovations in neuroscience," Pfeifer added.

 

Burlington, Mass.-based Lifordi is targeting rheumatoid arthritis, which causes inflammation and pain in the joints and affected 18 million people worldwide in 2019, according to the World Health Organization.

 

Lifordi, backed with $112 million in venture capital, combines an antibody with medications known as glucocorticoids -- which are the fastest and most-efficient way to control inflammation, according to the Arthritis Foundation. There is a trade-off: They can cause serious side effects, including increasing the risk for osteoporosis.

 

Lifordi is developing an ADC to steer glucocorticoids directly to target immune cells, where they exert their benefits, and away from other cells and tissues. In October, it advanced its drug into early clinical trials involving healthy volunteers.

 

To get this far, Lifordi has cleared technical hurdles.

 

The concept for Lifordi's drug originated at another company, ImmuNext, which was spun out from Dartmouth College to develop immunological drugs and license them out to pharmaceutical companies.

 

One of ImmuNext's products was an antibody-drug conjugate that delivers glucocorticoids to immune cells to treat autoimmune diseases. It capitalized on the discovery of a protein found primarily on the surface of immune cells called VISTA. When antibodies bind to it, they rapidly enter the immune cell, said Jay Rothstein, who was chief scientific officer of ImmuNext and holds the same title at Lifordi.

 

That rapid internalization gives glucocorticoids little time to harm healthy tissue and boosts their effect on immune cells, he said.

 

But ImmuNext hadn't accumulated enough animal data or conducted sufficient toxicology work to demonstrate the full potential of this ADC, said Lifordi CEO Arthur Tzianabos. Pharmaceutical companies balked when ImmuNext pitched it to them.

 

"There was a lot more data that needed to be generated, a lot more studies that needed to be done," Tzianabos said.

 

The retirement of ImmuNext's CEO led ImmuNext to wind down in 2023, according to Tzianabos. That is when venture firms ARCH Venture Partners, 5AM Ventures and Atlas Venture stepped in.

 

They provided $70 million in Series A financing to launch Lifordi and advance the VISTA-targeted antibody-drug conjugate candidate. With that funding, Lifordi conducted the animal, toxicology and formulation work needed to get ready for clinical trials.

 

For example, the company formulated the ADC so it could be delivered through a subcutaneous injection, enabling patients to administer it themselves -- a vital aspect of creating a commercially viable product.

 

In cancer, patients receive ADC therapy intravenously. But rheumatoid arthritis patients aren't routinely in the hospital and likely wouldn't opt for a medication that requires them to visit one, according to Tzianabos. Lifordi also intends to use its VISTA-targeted antibody to deliver other types of drugs for autoimmune diseases.

 

Other hurdles lie ahead. Lifordi's product hasn't yet been tested in patients with rheumatoid arthritis and competitors are developing a range of treatments, including oral medicines.

 

"We're going to need to have all the efficacy of steroids with a clean side-effect profile," said Atlas Venture Partner Bruce Booth. "If we can do that, we can have a very competitive product."” [1]

 

1. Business News: Lifordi Focuses on Autoimmune Diseases --- Biotech companies are using antibodies to precisely target drugs in the body. Gormley, Brian.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 29 Dec 2025: B3.