BAT Creates Plant-Based Technology Firm

BAT today announced the launch of KBio Holdings to accelerate the research, development and production of novel treatments. KBio will leverage the plant-based technology capabilities of BAT and Kentucky BioProcessing, BAT’s U.S. plant biologics organization.

KBio will explore new opportunities to develop its plant-based production system, which has the potential to offer greater speed, scale-up opportunity and thermostability. The new company will focus on delivering treatments for rare and infectious diseases by realizing and expanding the potential of both the plant-based technology platform as well as its existing clinical and preclinical vaccines and antibody pipeline.

KBio will look to form innovative R&D collaborations and financing aimed at expanding its pipeline and future portfolio, with an ambition of financial self-sufficiency.

Supporting the company’s future plans, a standalone operational structure for KBio is being established. This includes building a new executive leadership team led by Patrick Doyle as the CEO of KBio. Doyle brings more than 20 years of experience leading innovative biotech companies.

“I am excited by the opportunity to build on the significant accomplishments made by BAT and KBP,” said Doyle in a statement. “I am confident in the potential of KBio’s powerful plant-based platform, capabilities and emerging early-stage pipeline. To date, the technology has demonstrated its ability to produce novel antibody and vaccine candidates with high purity at a fraction of the time and cost of current technologies. The speed and efficiency demonstrated by the KBio platform has significant potential. This could enable us to progress to clinical studies faster than industry norms in the hope of delivering treatment solutions more quickly.”

“Science and innovation are fundamental to BAT and delivering on our purpose of building ‘A Better Tomorrow,’” said David O’Reilly, BAT’s director of scientific research. “We recognize the potential of our innovative plant-based technology and have established KBio to maximize that potential. We are excited to see what the future holds.”