Base to Base biotech podcast 52: Ketamine for depression, and a new company in the kidney disease space

On this week’s episode, we chat with Hans Eriksson, chief medical officer (CMO) of HMNC Brain Health, about ketamine and treatment-resistant depression, and with Krishna Polu, CEO, president and co-founder of new kidney health biotech company R1 Therapeutics.

Times:

03:57 HMNC Brain Health

29:47 R1 Therapeutics

HMNC Brain Health

HMNC Brain Health is a Munich-based clinical-stage biopharma company developing personalised treatments for depression. It has a phase 2 programme using oral, non-dissociative ketamine to treat treatment-resistant depression (TRD).

The Ketabon programme, a joint venture between HMNC Brain Health and Develco Pharma, features an oral prolonged-release formulation of ketamine (KET01) for treatment-resistant depression (TRD) with minimal dissociative side effects. This approach aims to make ketamine treatment suitable for use at home, potentially improving the risk profile and patient convenience compared to existing intravenous and intranasal ketamine therapies.

The development of oral prolonged-release ketamine could also extend to other indications beyond depression, such as anxiety, aggression, PTSD, and panic disorder.

Prior to HMNC, Eriksson was CMO at COMPASS Pathways and was senior director of clinical research at Lundbeck, as well as medical science director at AstraZeneca. He has led five clinical programmes in depression, three of which have resulted in regulatory approvals.

R1 Therapeutics

R1 Therapeutics is a US-based clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of first-in-class therapies for patients with kidney disease.

The company recently announced its launch – during National Kidney Month – with an oversubscribed $77.5m Series A financing, along with the exclusive global license to develop and commercialize AP306 outside of Greater China from China-based Alebund Pharmaceuticals, Ltd.

Proceeds from the financing will fund R1's global development program of AP306 in partnership with Alebund, including a phase 2b study planned to start later this year.

AP306 is a first-in-class, pan phosphate transporter inhibitor in development as a monotherapy for the treatment of hyperphosphatemia in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD). Whereas currently available approved phosphate lowering therapies work by inhibiting "passive" transport of phosphate through binding phosphate and other mechanisms, AP306 is the only agent that blocks the "active" transport of phosphate for the treatment of CKD.

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