🔒No small goal: Bindra’s Modifi Bio aims to eradicate cancer

For a patient, a diagnosis of glioblastoma is the worst of the worst. There’s no cure for this form of brain cancer and the average survival is just 15 to 18 months.

It doesn’t have to be that way, says Dr. Ranjit Bindra, co-founder and incoming CEO of Modifi Bio in New Haven.

His preclinical startup is redefining the rules of oncology treatment with the goal of eradicating cancer, he says.

That’s a high bar for a team of 3.5 employees that is operating on $6.4 million in seed funding and $2.4 million in grant money.

Bindra’s day job is as Harvey and Kate Cushing Professor at the Yale Brain Tumor Center and co-director of Yale Medical School. But he’s no stranger to the world of startups; Modifi Bio is his fifth.

He’s also co-founder of B3 Therapeutics, Alphina Therapeutics, Cybrexa Therapeutics and Helix Therapeutics. And he teases a sixth is in stealth mode with an anticipated unveiling in 2023.

Bindra and his team have identified a range of cancers with intrinsic DNA repair defects. Modifi Bio’s therapeutic directly targets these repair defects — the lack of the protein MGMT (O6-methylguanine methyl transferase) — and kills the cancer cells, the firm’s website explains.

These novel chameleon-like molecules fragment in cells and induce DNA modifications, which are irreparable in cancer cells with DNA repair defects.

That’s a major shift from the conventional approach of indirectly targeting proteins in cancer cells, the Modifi Bio website explains.

“We are changing the oncology treatment paradigm,” Bindra says.

The National Cancer Institute sees promise in the approach and has awarded Modifi Bio a $2.4 million fast-track Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant to accelerate its work. Other funding has come from seed investors including Connecticut Innovations, HighCape Capital, Ironwood Capital, Yale Ventures and the Brain Tumor Investment Fund, an affiliate of the National Brain Tumor Society.

Among the goals for 2023 is finding about $40 million in Series A funding. That’s big money for a preclinical biotech, Bindra acknowledges, particularly in a broader market landscape that could be teetering on recession.

Still, that’s the kind of funding necessary to allow Modifi Bio a three-year runway, Bindra says.

A busy new year

Among Modifi Bio’s 2023 projects are:

• Expanding its staffing toward a dozen;

• Building out 6,000 square feet of lab space in the Elm City Bioscience Center (55 Church St.);

• Finding a manufacturer for its oral therapeutic;

• Preparing its application paperwork for the Food and Drug Administration; and

• Making arrangements to start safety and dosage work with patients in 2024.

Bindra is hopeful the FDA will grant Modifi Bio expedited approval for its brain cancer approach by 2026 because there is no effective treatment option for the 12,000 patients diagnosed with glioblastomas each year in the U.S.

Bindra also points out that while Modifi Bio is offering “a new class of molecules,” the therapeutic involves only small changes at the atomic level from treatments already approved by the FDA.

In lab testing, the oral medication has demonstrated anti-tumor activity in cancer cells while sparing normal cells.

According to the firm’s website, “Approximately half of all glioblastomas and up to 80% of gliomas lack MGMT, making these cancers a natural first target.” But Bindra says similar markers are found in lung, colon and digestive system cancers.

“We are at the beginning of a field of medicine,” Bindra says, and there is a “clear path” to significant breakthroughs.

While the long-term future appears bright, Bindra is realistic about the challenges ahead. Even if Modifi Bio can raise $40 million in Series A money in 2023, the cost of Phase 3 drug testing is still far out of reach.

One option could be a partnership with a deep-pocketed pharmaceutical company. Other routes might involve selling off some foreign rights, or teaming up with major venture funders.

Bindra’s co-founders are Seth Herzon, Milton Harris ’29 Ph.D. Professor of Chemistry at Yale, and Kingson Lin, a Soros Fellow at Yale Medical School. Modifi Bio’s advisory panel includes senior figures from a range of Yale scientific programs as well as noted academic and industry oncology experts from across the country.