Century Therapeutics
a look ahead after a dismal 2023
There was a lot to like about Century Therapeutics IPSC 0.00%↑ after they IPO’d in 2021, they hit all the criteria for what was trending in biotech at the time between gene editing and allogeneic cell therapies. But its been a quick fall from IPO price to todays all-time-lows.
Stock performance VS XBI 0.00%↑ in the last two years:
While the index (green) dropped nearly 50% over the same time, Century is down nearly 95% and there are three key drivers of that divergence:
Gene Editing Boom and Bust: Century definitely IPO’d at the right time, as gene editing stocks were shooting up to insane valuations with mainly preclinical pipelines. This has since corrected across the field.
NK Cells: The sector was excited for NK cells to overcome many of the challenges T-cells faced. Then concerns durability of this approach came up after Fate Therapeutics presented data on their engineered off-the-shelf NK cell therapies later in 2021. Since then many have been bearish on NK cells. But it’s believed that immune-evasion edits (which Century does use) could improve durability.
Interest Rates: This was mentioned in the recent post on Caribou Biosciences. As interest rates rose, the cost of capital went up - so the most expensive biotech companies (cell and gene therapies) have been hit hardest.
Century recently reported their 3Q Earnings:
Ended third quarter 2023 with cash, cash equivalents, and investments of $284.3 million equaling approximately 4.8$/share in cash.
Key Updates:
Appointed a new CEO: Brent Pfeiffenberger, Pharm.D., MBA
ASH Poster abstract published on CNTY-101: Phase 1 ELiPSE-1 trial of CNTY-101 in relapsed/refractory CD19 positive B-cell lymphomas detailing a case study on a patient with a complete response maintained following 4 cycles of CNTY-101.
Century and FUJI Cellular Dynamics announced a license agreement for iPSC-derived therapies for the treatment of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases.
A Look Ahead
The Company expects cash runway into 2026.
ASH Conference in December: updated data to include additional results from patients treated in Dose Cohort 1 and preliminary data from patients in Dose Cohort 2.
Speculative Thoughts