Additional update about the investment in Immunomic Therapeutics

We recently explained about the investment in Immunomic Therapeutics (IT for short) via YouTube. However, we would like to provide the additional information about IT that is related to some of the inquiries from stockholders.

1. HLB has submitted NDA of Rivoceranib with the FDA, while at the same time establishing a 'conviction and diffusion’ strategy to quickly enter the global anti-cancer market, where speed competition is accelerating.

In this case, ‘conviction’ is the conviction of Rivoceranib to be marketed as a global new drug, and ‘diffusion’ is 1) rapid expansion of Rivoceranib’s indications and 2) maximization of the potential and possibility of the company through the open collaboration.

We are speeding up the various clinical trials of Rivoceranib for 1), and we decided to invest and acquire IT, a Washington-based bio company that develops anticancer cellular immunotherapy under the strategy of 2).

2. The global cell therapy market, one of the pipelines that IT is focusing on, is expected to grow at US $ 34.41 billion and CAGR by 16.81% in 2025.

3. Although global funds have shown interest in IT, IT wanted a partner who

understands the bio business rather than a fund that focuses on short-term performance and return on investment

has experience in clinical practice and regulations, including global clinical trial, and

supports and cooperates in the long term and after confirming through several paths that HLB has been cooperating/supporting Elevar through investment with minimal management over the past 10 years, IT selected HLB as a partner.

4. In addition, the elevated status of HLB and Elevar after ESMO in 2019 contributed to the negotiations with IT on favorable terms. Eventually, in 10 months after the first discussion with IT in April of 2019, the negotiation reached an agreement.

5. As has been the case with investments and management in Elevar, HLB plans to continue to invest and support IT in the long term. In other words, we will increase the investment scale by 51%. The only difference between IT and Elevar is ‘when’ to invest. If the investment in Elevar was in the ‘early stages’, the investment in IT is when the ‘performance is visible’.

6. UNITE, an excellent platform technology of IT, is being developed as an immune cell therapy drug, therapeutic vaccine, cancer immunotherapy drug, and allergy therapy drug and is showing a large scalability. It has already been told that allergen-targeted therapies developed under the UNITE platform have received L/O on condition of 315 million USD + royalty without the obligation to return to Astellas Pharma, a global pharmaceutical company in Japan.

7. Several global bio pharmaceutical reports recognize IT as a leading company in the future, recognizing platform technology and pipeline excellence. Here are the quotes from some of the reports:

- 2019.10.22. Named as a leading company in the field of gene vaccine immunotherapy in ‘Human DNA Market Astonishing Growth by 2025’ (HTF Market Intelligence)

- 2020.01.30. Named global leading player in ‘Global DNA Vaccine Market Report 2020~2026’ (Data Bridge Market Research)

- 2020.01.13 Selected as a global top manufacturer in ‘Human DNA Vaccine Market Report’ (Journal I’Action Regionale)

- 2020.02.02 Selected as a major key player in the ‘Peanut Allergy Vaccine Market Report’ (Coherent Marke Insight)

- 2020.02.03 selected as a global key player in ‘Peanut Allergy Market Report 2020’

- Listed as a top player in DNA vaccines and allergies by various research institutes such as ‘Breathing Lab’ / ‘Galus Australis’.

8. The IT pipeline will be discussed in detail in the following IR Letter. However, we would like to discuss about the ITI-1000, one of the core pipelines, in advance due to the number of inquiries.

ITI-1000 is currently at phase 2 clinical trial for brain tumor-targeted immune cell therapy.

developing as a first-in-class immunotherapy, with a 5-year survival rate of 7 times higher compared to existing treatments in phase 1 results, and the progress of phase 2 clinical trials is at 80% level, which is expected to be done within this year.

“Conditional Sales Approval” will be possible if the results are designated as innovative new drugs in line with expectations. In the case of brain tumors, surgery may not be possible due to the location of the tumor, depending on the patient. The poster below is about the complete cases of tumors that IT announced at the SNO (Society for Neuro-Oncology) in September 2019.