OREANDA-NEWS. May 20, 2015. Abzena plc (AIM:ABZA), a life sciences company providing services and technologies that enable the development of biopharmaceutical products, announced today that its subsidiary Antitope Limited has entered into an agreement with Apitope, a private European biotech company focused on the discovery and development of disease-modifying treatments for autoimmune diseases. Under the agreement, Antitope will investigate and measure the immunological status of haemophilia A patients after treatment.

Apitope's patented discovery platform enables selection of potential disease-modifying peptide therapies for the autoimmune disease of interest. It has a pipeline of compounds in development including ATX-F8-117, which has been designed to induce immune tolerance to blood coagulation factor VIII in haemophilia A patients.

Haemophilia A is caused by a deficiency in blood coagulation factor VIII and is treated with replacement factor VIII protein. About 30% of haemophilia A patients develop neutralising antibodies to factor VIII which inhibits its activity and thus renders treatment less effective. Such patients are at risk of serious and life-threatening bleeding.

Matthew Baker, CSO of Abzena, stated: "We are excited by the opportunity to be working with Apitope to design and run a bespoke study which will help them understand patient responses to treatment with ATX-F8-117."

Keith Martin, CEO of Apitope, added: "ATX-F8-117 is currently in late preclinical development and we are delighted to work with Abzena on measuring the impact of this treatment for haemophilia A patients."