Ervaxx debuts with a new source of neoantigens

Ervaxx Ltd. emerged from stealth on Tuesday with £13 million ($16.8 million) from SV Health Investors and a platform for discovering and validating a new type of neoantigen present in the dark matter of the genome. These “dark antigens” appear to be highly conserved, enabling the biotech to pursue an off-the-shelf strategy for its cancer vaccines and cell therapies.

President and CEO Kevin Pojasek said the antigens get their name from being discovered in the roughly 98% of the human genome that was previously thought to be non-coding and to lack function...