Kite Pharma

Kite Pharma, a subsidiary of Gilead Sciences, develops cancer immunotherapy products with a primary focus on genetically engineered autologous T cell therapy with chimeric antigen receptors (CAR-T). Kite Pharma, a subsidiary of Gilead Sciences, develops cancer immunotherapy products with a primary focus on genetically engineered autologous T cell therapy with chimeric antigen receptors (CAR-T). The Santa Monica, California-based company was founded in 2009 by Arie Belldegrun, M.D., FACS, an Israeli-American oncologist, who served as the company's chairman, president and chief executive officer. On August 28, 2017, Gilead Sciences announced that it would acquire Kite Pharma for $11.9 billion in an all-cash deal, equating to $180 cash per share. The deal will add the promising CAR-T candidate to Gilead's existing portfolio. The acquisition was completed in October 2017. In October 2017, Kite Pharma’s therapy, Yescarta (axicabtagene ciloleucel) became the first CAR-T therapy approved by the FDA for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory large B-cell lymphoma after two or more lines of systemic therapy. MIT Technology Review ranked Kite Pharma 7th in its annual list of 50 Smartest Companies 2017. Axicabtagene ciloleucel (KTE-C19, ZUMA-3) is an investigational therapy (for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL)) in which a patient's T cells are genetically modified to express a chimeric antigen receptor designed to target the antigen CD19, a protein expressed on the cell surface of B-cell lymphomas and leukemias. It has US FDA Breakthrough Therapy Designation (Dec 2015) for the treatment of patients with refractory diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL), primary mediastinal B cell lymphoma (PMBCL), and transformed follicular lymphoma (TFL). In October, Kite Pharma entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) for the development and commercialization of products for the treatment of multiple cancer indications. In December, the company announced data in its lead clinical development program with the NCI, demonstrating that Kite’s most advanced immunotherapy product candidate – KTE-C19 CAR – can produce robust and durable tumor shrinkage in patients with an aggressive form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, known as diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL). The clinical data were presented at the 55th American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting. In March, the company announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Office of Orphan Products Development granted orphan drug designation for the company's proposed therapy for DLBCL. In June, Kite Pharma entered into an exclusive, worldwide license with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to certain intellectual property related to TCR-based product candidates that target the NY-ESO-1 antigen for the treatment of cancers expressing NY-ESO-1.