South Korea’s biopharmaceutical company SillaJen Inc. has signed a contract with ABL Europe, a French contract manufacturing organization (CMO), for production of its virus-based cancer treatment JX-970, the company announced on Monday.

Under the deal, ABL Europe will be responsible for producing JX-970 and managing its quality for SillaJen that plans to conduct clinical tests for the cancer-fighting immunotherapy in the first half of next year.

JX-970, derived from vaccinia vaccine strain, is designed to remove tumors selectively by inactivating thymidine kinase (TK) and vaccinia growth factor (VGF) gene, and express granulocyte macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) to stimulate immune responses. SillaJen is authorized for its global sales.

ABL Europe, based in Strasbourg in France, is also in charge of producing SillaJen’s investigational liver cancer treatment Pexa-Vec (JX-594) under a phase 3 clinical study.

As of 3:12 p.m. on Monday, shares of Kosdaq-listed SillaJen fell 0.68 percent to 102,300 won in Seoul trading.

By Shin Chan-ok and Choi Mira

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