Moderna joins the personalized cancer vaccine rush with third new venture
Moderna Therapeutics is launching the third new personalized cancer vaccine venture in as many weeks, spinning out its messenger RNA tech into a separate entity dubbed Caperna.
This is Moderna’s fourth venture spinout and its second cancer play, which will initially be helmed by Tal Zaks, the chief medical officer at Cambridge, MA-based Moderna and former head of oncology R&D for Sanofi ($SNY).
Moderna is banking on its manufacturing expertise to quickly whip up small batches of a personalized cancer vaccine designed to target the neoepitopes found on the unique antigens created by a tumor. And it’s the new, new thing in oncology, which has long been one of the hottest fields in biotech.
