• Targeted radionuclide delivery platform strengthened by new safety and mechanistic data
• Data includes review of high tumor penetration potential of DARPins and reduced kidney accumulation via DARPin engineering
• New findings will be shared on April 18, 2023, at the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2023

ZURICH-SCHLIEREN, Switzerland and CONCORD, Mass., April 14, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Molecular Partners AG (SIX: MOLN; NASDAQ: MOLN), a clinical-stage biotech company developing a new class of custom-built protein drugs known as DARPin therapeutics, today announced that further preclinical data supporting the company’s Radio DARPin Therapy Platform will be shared at the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting held April 14-19 in Orlando, Florida.

Poster: “DARPins as powerful targeting agents for radioligand therapeutics”
Number: 5037
Timing: April 18, 2023, 1:30pm – 5:00pm
Presenter: Daniel Steiner, Ph.D., Senior Vice President of Research

Molecular Partners’ proprietary Radio DARPin Therapy (RDT) platform represents a unique and innovative delivery system designed to deliver radioactive payloads to solid tumors without accumulating in other tissues. Historically, small protein-based delivery vectors have accumulated in the kidney, presenting a tolerability risk.

Data within the presentation demonstrate that both the affinity and small size of DARPins can have an impact on tumor penetration. In addition to this, the data highlights that surface engineering of the DARPin backbone is a promising strategy to strongly reduce the kidney accumulation of DARPins, without affecting tumor uptake. The data also show that the addition of other orthogonal strategies results in a further reduction of kidney accumulation.

“We continue to deepen the data set supporting the distinctive target product profile of RDTs, addressing historic challenges for protein-based radionuclide vectors through the particular attributes of DARPins as an engineered protein drug class,” said Daniel Steiner, Ph.D., Senior Vice President of Research at Molecular Partners. “By improving on both the potential efficacy and safety of radiotherapy, we see a true potential for the RDT platform to expand the treatable universe, beyond the traditional ligand targets and into a broad range of tumor targets.”

Molecular Partners is developing candidates both in-house as well as in collaboration with Novartis, a global leader in radioligand therapies. Molecular Partners’ first disclosed target for its in-house RDT programs is Delta-like ligand 3 (DLL3), a protein which has low expression in healthy tissues but significantly increased expression in certain tumor types.

Previously reported data supporting the RDT platform presented at TAT-12 can be found here, while the latest results will be shared via a poster at AACR 2023 on April 18. The poster will be made available on the Molecular Partners website.

About Molecular Partners AG 

Molecular Partners AG is a clinical-stage biotech company developing DARPin therapeutics, a new class of custom-built protein drugs designed to address challenges current modalities cannot. The Company has formed partnerships with leading pharmaceutical companies to advance DARPin therapeutics in the areas of oncology and infectious disease and has compounds in various stages of clinical and preclinical development across multiple therapeutic areas. www.molecularpartners.com; Find us on Twitter - @MolecularPrtnrs.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

Any statements contained in this press release that do not describe historical facts may constitute forward-looking statements as that term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as amended, including, without limitation, implied and express statements regarding the clinical development of Molecular Partners’ current or future product candidates, expectations regarding timing for reporting data from ongoing clinical trials or the initiation of future clinical trials, the potential therapeutic and clinical benefits of Molecular Partners’ product candidates, the selection and development of future antiviral or other programs, and Molecular Partners’ expected expenses and cash utilization for 2022 and its expectation that its current cash resources will be sufficient to fund its operations and capital expenditure requirements into 2026. These statements may be identified by words such as “believe”, “expect”, “may”, “plan”, “potential”, “will”, “would” and similar expressions, and are based on Molecular Partners AG’s current beliefs and expectations. These statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those reflected in such statements. Some of the key factors that could cause actual results to differ from Molecular Partners’ expectations include its plans to develop and potentially commercialize its product candidates; Molecular Partners’ reliance on third party partners and collaborators over which it may not always have full control; Molecular Partners’ ongoing and planned clinical trials and preclinical studies for its product candidates, including the timing of such trials and studies; the risk that the results of preclinical studies and clinical trials may not be predictive of future results in connection with future clinical trials; the timing of and Molecular Partners’ ability to obtain and maintain regulatory approvals for its product candidates; the extent of clinical trials potentially required for Molecular Partners’ product candidates; the clinical utility and ability to achieve market acceptance of Molecular Partners’ product candidates; the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Molecular Partners’ preclinical studies, clinical trials or operations, or the operations of third parties on which it relies; Molecular Partners’ plans and development of any new indications for its product candidates; Molecular Partners’ commercialization, marketing and manufacturing capabilities and strategy; Molecular Partners’ intellectual property position; Molecular Partners’ ability to identify and in-license additional product candidates; and other risks and uncertainties that are described in the Risk Factors section of Molecular Partners’ Annual Report on Form 20-F for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2022 expected to be filed with Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on March 9, 2023 and other filings Molecular Partners makes with the SEC. These documents are available on the Investors page of Molecular Partners’ website at www.molecularpartners.com. Any forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this press release and are based on information available to Molecular Partners as of the date of this release, and Molecular Partners assumes no obligation to, and does not intend to, update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

For further details, please contact:
Seth Lewis, SVP IR and Strategy
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Tel: +1 781 420 2361

Antonio Ligi, Head of Communications
Zürich-Schlieren, Switzerland
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+41 44 755 57 53