HOPKINTON, Mass., Oct. 31, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq:SBPH), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing novel therapeutics for the treatment of viral infections, cancer, and inflammatory diseases, today announced third quarter 2016 financial results and provided an update on recent corporate and clinical developments.

“We made steady progress in the third quarter of 2016, as we continued to enroll patients in our ACHIEVE Phase 2 clinical trial involving our lead compound, SB 9200, in chronic Hepatitis B. We remain on track and look forward to reporting initial results from the first dosing cohort in the first half of next year,” said Martin Driscoll, President and Chief Executive Officer of Spring Bank. “In our clinical development program for SB 9200, an orally-available selective immunomodulator, we seek to demonstrate that SB 9200 has the potential to become a backbone therapy in a combination drug regimen in the effort to increase the functional cure rate for chronic HBV patients. To further this clinical development strategy for SB 9200 in chronic HBV, we announced a clinical collaboration with Arrowhead Pharmaceuticals Inc. earlier this month to explore the use of SB 9200 in combination with Arrowhead’s siRNA compound, ARC-520, in the Arrowhead MONARCH Phase 2 trial in chronic HBV patients.”

“In the past few weeks, we also disclosed early scientific evidence from preclinical studies in which SB 11285, our next generation STING (STimulator of INterferon Genes) agonist, causes apoptosis of multiple tumor-derived cell lines. We look forward to developing this Spring Bank proprietary development compound as a potential immunotherapeutic agent in the treatment of various cancers. We believe SB 11285 has the potential not only as a monotherapy treatment but could also prove effective in combination with other cancer therapies.”

Third Quarter 2016 and Recent Highlights

• Continued patient enrollment in the ACHIEVE global Phase 2 clinical trial of SB 9200 in chronic HBV patients. The Phase 2a portion is a placebo-controlled, sequential-cohort, double-blind trial to evaluate increasing doses of SB 9200 (25mg, 50mg, 100mg and 200mg) as monotherapy for 12 weeks followed by tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (marketed by Gilead Sciences, Inc. as Viread®) 300 mg for an additional 12 weeks. The company is on track to report preliminary results from the first dosing cohort in the first half of 2017 with top line results for all patients treated with monotherapy SB 9200 in the Phase 2a anticipated by year-end 2017.
• Consummated a pre-clinical/clinical collaboration with Arrowhead Pharmaceuticals for the study of SB 9200 combined with siRNA compound, ARC-520, in chronic HBV patients. The companies plan to first conduct preclinical models with both agents together and then study the agents clinically in a cohort to be added to Arrowhead’s ongoing MONARCH Phase 2b study, in which patients will receive a dosing regimen that includes ARC-520, SB 9200, and an oral direct-acting antiviral.
• Identified lead compound (SB 11285) and continued to advance the pre-clinical development of the Company's immuno-oncology program with the STING pathway. Recent published scientific literature indicates that STING can detect the presence of tumor cells and the activation of STING can result in induction of cellular interferon production and promote an aggressive and strong anti-tumor response. The Company’s goal is to achieve pre-clinical proof-of-principal in relevant oncology models in 2017.
• Two poster presentations related to pre-clinical data for SB 11285, Spring Bank’s novel next generation STING agonist, were presented by Spring Bank scientists at the AACR Special Conference on Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy. Among the key pre-clinical findings were that SB 11285 is a highly potent STING agonist that causes the induction of Interferons (IFN), NF-KB, Interferon-stimulating genes (ISGs), cytokines, and pattern recognition receptors (PRRs). SB 11285 was also shown to cause apoptosis of multiple tumor-derived cell lines.

Third Quarter 2016 Financial Results

Net loss for the quarter ended September 30, 2016 was $4.1 million, or $0.53 per basic and diluted share, as compared to a net loss of $3.4 million, or $0.59 per basic and diluted share, for the same period in 2015.

Research and development expenses for the quarter ended September 30, 2016 were $2.7 million as compared to $2.1 million for the same period in 2015. The increase in R&D expenses was due to increased spending on clinical trial-related activities for the Company’s ongoing Phase 2a clinical trial of SB 9200.

General and administrative expenses for the quarter ended September 30, 2016 were $1.5 million as compared to $1.6 million for the same period in 2015.

The weighted-average number of shares outstanding used to calculate basic and diluted loss per share was 7,759,630 in the third quarter of 2016 compared to 5,796,091 in the third quarter of 2015.

As of September 30, 2016, Spring Bank had $15.6 million of cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities.

About Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals

Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company engaged in the discovery and development of a novel class of therapeutics using its proprietary small molecule nucleic acid hybrid, or SMNH, chemistry platform. The company is developing its most advanced SMNH product candidate, SB 9200, for the treatment of viral diseases, including hepatitis B virus.