Cue Biopharma’s autoimmune pipeline consists of therapies currently in preclinical development. Image Credit: Andrii Yalanskyi / Shutterstock.

Cue Biopharma has instituted strategic restructuring measures with a plan to focus on autoimmune programmes and carry out a workforce reduction.

The company plans to fire 25% of its staff, which along with other cash reduction measures is expected to save Cue Biopharma $30m in operating expenses next year. The company added that following the restructuring its cash runway will extend to mid-2025.

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Cue Biopharma’s stock has been on a decline since May 2020, and since the start of this year, it has decreased by more than 77%. The company’s market cap currently stands at $34.2m.

The company has also put its oncology programmes on the backburner and plans to pursue partnerships to continue the development of these candidates.

“We intend to preserve the potential value of our clinical oncology programs by retaining requisite clinical capabilities to enable maturation of clinical survival data in the current ongoing Phase I trials of CUE-101 and CUE-102,” said Cue BioPharma’s chief executive officer Daniel Passeri.

It has been a challenging few years for fundraising in biotech and several companies have been forced to institute cash-saving measures. Companies such as Candel Therapeutics and Ultimovacs have been forced to streamline their pipelines and fire staff to extend their cash runways. While companies such as Galecto and Travere Therapeutics have fired a considerable portion of their workforce after their lead candidates proved ineffective.

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Cue’s CUE-101 is an interleukin 2 (IL-2) inhibitor, which is being investigated as monotherapy and a combination treatment for human papillomavirus (HPV)-driven recurrent/metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) in a Phase I trial.

The combination therapy demonstrated an overall survival rate of 46%, compared to 19% with the PD-1 inhibitor Keytruda (pembrolizumab) in a Phase I trial (NCT03978689) for HNSCC patients. Furthermore, the combination treatment showed a median progression-free survival of 8.3 months, compared to 3.4 months seen with Keytruda monotherapy.

CUE-102 is also an IL-2 inhibitor that selectively triggers tumour antigen-specific T cells for treating Wilms’ Tumour 1 (WT1)-expressing cancers. The therapy is being investigated as a treatment for WT1-positive recurrent/metastatic cancer in a Phase I trial (NCT05360680).

Cue Biopharma’s autoimmune pipeline consists of a bispecific fusion protein, CUE-401, developed in partnership with Ono Pharmaceutical, and CUE-501, a bispecific antibody. Both candidates are in preclinical development.