Company: ABUS
Filing Date: 2025-03-27
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001447028-25-000083
Chunk: 33

Company: Arbutus Biopharma Corp
Filing Date: 2025-03-27
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1
Chunk 33
---
 and favorable safety profile. However, in most cases, once IFN and NA therapies are stopped, virus replication resumes and liver inflammation and fibrosis may still progress. While these treatments reduce viral load, less than 10% of patients are functionally cured after a finite treatment duration. With such low cure rates, most patients with cHBV infection are required to take NA therapy daily for the rest of their lives. 

Our Product Candidates

Our pipeline includes two product candidates that target various steps in the HBV viral lifecycle and consists of the following programs:

 10

We continue to explore expansion opportunities for our pipeline through potential strategic alliances. 

RNAi therapeutic (imdusiran, AB-729)  

RNAi therapeutics represent a significant advancement in drug development. RNAi therapeutics utilize a natural pathway within cells to silence genes by eliminating the disease-causing proteins that they code for. We are developing an RNAi therapeutic, imdusiran (AB-729), that is designed to reduce HBsAg expression and other HBV antigens in people with cHBV infection. Reducing HBsAg is widely believed to be a key prerequisite to enable a patient’s immune system to reawaken and respond against the virus.  

Imdusiran (AB-729) has the following advantages over other RNAi therapeutics in development for cHBV infection:

–Targeted to hepatocytes using our proprietary covalently conjugated GalNAc delivery technology which provides highly efficient liver-targeted uptake and enables subcutaneous dosing.

–Unique nucleotide sequence that is single trigger and targets all HBV transcripts including HBx from cccDNA and integrated DNA.

–Specific chemical modifications that reduce off-target effects while maintaining potency and providing durable liver exposure. 

–Delivered at a low dose and less frequently.

–Immune activation properties with HBV-specific T-cell immune restoration and a decrease in exhausted T-cells in key responder patients.

–In combination with interferon and NA therapy, has provided the highest functional cure rates in cHBV patients to date with a 50% (3/6) functional cure rate in patients with HBsAg<1000 IU/mL at baseline.

IM-PROVE I Phase 2a proof-of-concept clinical trial evaluating imdusiran in combination with IFN

We have completed enrollment in IM-PROVE I, a randomized, open label, multicenter Phase 2a proof-of-concept clinical trial investigating the safety and antiviral activity of imd