A biotech company developing immunotherapies to treat various types of cancer, Stingray Therapeutics is structured around new effort to fight cancer with 2nd generation immune-oncology agents -- an approach involving unleashing the full immune system to take this fight to an entirely new level. The first generation of immune-oncology therapies - checkpoint inhibitors - leverage adaptive immunity to counter cancers immunosuppressive checkpoints. A problem factor using this approach is that many patients develop resistance and/or are non- responsive to treatment given tumors are cold i.e. the cancer unrecognized by adaptive immune system .. because the cancer has "turned off" innate immunity. Innate immunity is your other major arm of the immune system. Innate immunity is your first immune response to a threat and also a beacon to adaptive immunity to reveal the threat and tell adaptive immunity where to go to fight. Immunotherapy drugs like Stingrays open up innate immunity to reveal the cancer cells previously hidden from adaptive immunity. This allows the immune system to attack and kill the cancer. Stingray Therapeutics is developing SR-8541A, an oral small molecule therapeutic targeting the fundamental innate immunity pathway, STING (STimulator of INterferon Genes). Stingrays target, Ectonucleotide Pyrophosphatase / Phosphodiesterase 1 (ENPP1), is the direct negative regulator of STING. This is what cancers dramatically upregulate to block innate immunity in the tumor microenvironment. Stingrays drug allows for activation of the fundamental innate immune pathway so the cancer can be identified and killed via innate immunity and the deeper activation of adaptive immunity.
