INB-100

Along with the workforce layoffs, the executive team will see their pay cut by 11% effective Sept. 1. Just a few months after dosing the first patient in a phase 2 trial for newly diagnosed glioblastoma, IN8bio is hitting the brakes—and laying off half of its workforce.The drug being put on the back burner is INB-400, an autologous gamma-delta T-cell therapy. The biotech has suspended patient enrollment in the phase 2 study “while it explores partnership opportunities for the program.”The layoffs will bring down the biotech’s workforce from 37 to 19 full-time employees, affecting teams at both the company’s New York City and Birmingham, Alabama, sites, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.Along with the staffing cuts, the executive team will see their pay cut by 11% effective Sept. 1. IN8bio, formerly known as Incysus Therapeutics, is shifting focus to INB-100, an allogeneic cell therapy being tested in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) receiving bone marrow transplants, according to a Sept. 4 release. The company received guidance from the FDA earlier this summer on how to advance INB-100 and will be adding a control cohort to its ongoing phase 1 trial. Funds opened up from the strategic reorganization will be used to continue enrolling patients in an expanded trial cohort, with a goal of enrolling about 25 patients.As of Aug. 30, none of the patients who received INB-100 have seen their disease relapse, the company said. The phase 1 trial for another cell therapy in newly diagnosed glioblastomas, INB-200, will also continue. “The data across both of our INB-100 and INB-200 clinical programs remain positive and robust. We are committed to building upon the data for INB-100 in AML, and we are making the difficult decision to advance fewer pipeline programs, reduce our spend and focus on key milestones that can help to generate near-term interest and value creation,” IN8bio CEO and co-founder William Ho said in the release.The Birmingham-based biotech went public in 2022 with a downsized IPO that raised just over $10 million, below the $69 million the company had originally hoped for.IN8bio ended June with $10.2 million in the bank, less than half of the $21.3 million the company entered 2024 with.

IN8bio is putting its brain tumor development program on the back burner and axing almost half of its employees in an effort to cut costs and divert resources to an early-phase blood cancer asset. The New York-based biotech is hitting pause on its 120-patient Phase 2 trial of INB-400 for recurrent or newly diagnosed glioblastoma, which just dosed its first patient in April. IN8bio will stop further recruitment into the study as it searches for “partnership opportunities,” according to a company release Wednesday. As for the Phase 1 trial of INB-200 in newly diagnosed glioblastoma, which has enrolled 21 patients, the company will keep tracking long-term remissions and overall survival. IN8bio will continue monitoring all patients across both studies. The “difficult decision” will allow the company to “reduce our spend and focus on key milestones that can help to generate near-term interest and value creation,” CEO William Ho said in the release. As for IN8bio’s layoffs, it is cutting around 49% of its staffers across all functions. The drugmaker had 39 full-time employees at the end of June, according to an SEC filing from last month. The workforce reduction is expected to cost IN8bio less than half a million dollars. The company ended June with just $10.2 million in cash, according to its latest earnings release . It is cutting executives’ pay by 11%, according to a Wednesday SEC filing . IN8bio says these cuts mean that it would have fuel for its allogeneic gamma delta T cell therapy program for acute myeloid leukemia. The candidate, dubbed INB-100, is being tested in a University of Kansas-sponsored Phase 1 dose-escalation trial in the post-transplant maintenance setting. As of last month, all eight AML patients in the Phase 1 given INB-100 were relapse-free at a median follow-up of 18.7 months. But certain patients in the 38-subject study with other forms of leukemia who relapsed have since died of disease progression. Following a meeting with the FDA, the company plans to add a control group to the study and continue enrolling into the expansion cohort with a target of 25 additional AML patients. It expects to have long-term follow-up results ready late next year and in 2026.