Biotechnology company BioNTech SE (NASDAQ: BNTX) recently revealed that it has expanded its strategic partnership with a fellow biotechnology company, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, to enhance its FixVac candidate BNT116 in combination with Libtayo (cemiplimab), a PD-1 inhibitor, to cure non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
Following the news, shares of the company rose almost 7% to close at $135 in Tuesday’s extended trading session.
The mRNA-based cancer vaccine, BNT116, is based on BioNTech’s FixVac platform, which consists of a fixed combination of shared tumor-associated antigens that were identified to be frequently expressed in NSCLC.
Under the terms of the agreement, development costs for the trials will be shared equally by BioNTech and Regeneron.
Management Commentary
The Chief Medical Officer at BioNTech, Özlem Türeci, said, “Advanced NSCLC still has a five-year survival rate of only 25% leaving patients with very limited treatment options. We believe that a potent vaccine that induces strong T cell responses against shared tumor associated antigens combined with PD-1 blockade that further enables the activated T cell repertoire will help to address the high unmet medical need in this indication. We look forward to further building on our successful collaboration with Regeneron to accelerate the clinical development of BNT116 in our growing mRNA oncology pipeline.”
Stock Rating
On March 8, Berenberg Bank analyst Zhiqiang Shu reiterated a Buy rating on the stock with a price target of $400, which implies upside potential of 212.1% from current levels.
The Wall Street community is cautiously optimistic about the stock and has a Moderate Buy consensus rating based on 3 Buys and 7 Holds. The average BioNTech stock prediction of $281.78 implies that the stock has upside potential of 119.9% from current levels. Shares have gained 32.8% over the past year.
Negative News Sentiment
News Sentiment for BNTX is Very Negative based on 32 articles over the past seven days. All articles have Bearish sentiment, compared to the sector average of 37%.
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