AbCellera

AbCellera is a Canadian biotechnology company based in Vancouver, British Columbia.

AbCellera has partnered with a notable assortment of pharmaceutical companies and other interests, including Ablynx, Autolus Therapeutics, Denali Therapeutics, Gilead Sciences, GlaxoSmithKline, IGM Biosciences, Kodiak Sciences, Lyell, Merck, Sanofi, and Teva.¹⁾

The company is best known for its leading role in the Pandemic Prevention Platform, a project of DARPA's Biological Technologies Office.

Subsidiaries: TetraGenetics, Inc., AbCellera Australia Pty Ltd.,

In November 2016, AbCellera received a $645,000 USD grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a test for tuberculosis.²⁾ The company received a second grant in January 2022 to “identify potent anti-RSV monoclonal antibodies to protect infants in low and middle income countries from RSV infection morbidity and mortality.”³⁾

In January 2017, AbCellera announced that it would be collaborating with Pfizer to “apply its proprietary monoclonal antibody (mAb) screening platform to attempt to discover function-modulating antibodies against undisclosed membrane protein targets.”^{4) 5)}

In February 2019, AbCellera announced “a multi-target, multi-year deal with Novartis, to identify antibodies for ten therapeutic targets in Novartis’ pipeline, using a unique combination of microfluidics, high-throughput imaging, genomics, deep computing and AI.”⁶⁾

In 2018, AbCellera received US$30.6 million from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to lead one of four research groups aimed at developing antibody treatments for pandemics.^{7) 8) 9)}

In June 2020, AbCellera announced it had begun the world's first study of a potential antibody treatment against COVID-19, with a Phase 1 trial of LY-CoV555 (Bamlanivimab), in collaboration with Eli Lilly and Company.¹⁰⁾ The drug was granted an Emergency Use Authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in November 2020, and subsequently renewed in February and March 2021.^{11) 12)}

The EUA was revoked in April 2021, with the FDA citing an updated conclusion that “the known and potential benefits of bamlanivimab alone no longer outweigh the known and potential risks for the product,” because of significantly reduced efficacy against emerging variants of SARS-CoV-2.¹³⁾

A second COVID-19 monoclonal antibody therapy (Bebtelovimab) was given Emergency Use Authorization in February 2022, with the U.S. Government committing to a $720 million purchase of up to 600,000 doses.¹⁴⁾