BioCentury
ARTICLE | Clinical News

Caladrius ends CIRM-funded melanoma trial

January 8, 2016 2:21 AM UTC

Caladrius Biosciences Inc. (NASDAQ:CLBS) sank $0.36 (34%) to $0.70 on Thursday after announcing plans to discontinue a Phase III study of CLBS20 as monotherapy to treat metastatic melanoma. The company said immune checkpoint inhibitors have improved outcomes for melanoma patients and shifted the landscape toward combination therapies. It hopes to find a partner for CLBS20 in other oncology indications or for a combination therapy.

The California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) said it had distributed $3 million of a planned $17.7 million award to Caladrius to study CLBS20, which consists of autologous dendritic cells loaded with antigen from self-renewing, proliferating autologous tumor cells in GM-CSF. CIRM said it would make the remaining $14.7 million available for other stem cell projects. ...