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A New Zealand biotech investment opportunity with global impact

Broad-spectrum antivirals are vital for the treatment of diseases and for pandemic preparedness

Conventional antiviral development is difficult, expensive and very time-consuming. Most antivirals are small molecule drugs, which target a very specific part of a specific virus, and work as an inhibitor to replication in some way. Many have unpleasant side effects.

95% of the viruses that afflict humans have no approved antiviral treatment

Viruses are tricky targets that constantly mutate and have evolved ways to evade both the immune system and antiviral drugs. As a result, there are currently only approved antivirals for 11 viral diseases (HIV, HBV, HCV, Herpes, Influenza, CMV, VZV, RSV, Smallpox, HPV & Covid), and the rest, including widespread diseases like Dengue, have no approved antiviral treatment. The only treatment for Dengue currently is supportive care – rest, hydration, and pain relief.

Climate and environmental factors are driving pandemic risk

Warming trends are causing the increased severity and wider spread of infectious diseases, whilst habitat loss and urban expansion is behind new infectious diseases emerging. By 2050, 500M more people will be at risk from mosquito-borne diseases, including 55M in the USA.

Our innovation: The VTose Antiviral Platform

Kimer Med’s antivirals are large molecule compounds, also known as biologics. Rather than targeting a very specific aspect of a virus, our compound targets long strands of dsRNA. This target is common to ALL viruses (with one possible exception), as it is produced by viruses inside cells during their lytic replication cycle. We target the viral dsRNA, bind to it, and this triggers apoptosis – the orderly process by which the immune system cleans up infected or damaged cells. This stops the virus replicating.

• We have spent the last three years de-risking our science
• We’ve developed a proprietary platform to rapidly formulate custom, targeted antivirals
• We have achieved success against 11 different viruses
• These results include efficacy in vitro against all 4 serotypes of Dengue, and Zika
• We’ve proven our antiviral’s broad-spectrum capability in vitro
• We’ve confirmed efficacy and safety in a small in vivo study

Our goal is to create a family of broad-spectrum antivirals that will work against many current, and currently neglected diseases – a market that is worth billions of dollars annually. The current global antiviral market is worth around $NZD 97 billion annually (5.5% CAGR), and this consists of antivirals for only 11 diseases.

We are currently in the lead optimisation phase.  We have some further testing in process to confirm efficacy against more viruses, and we are planning more in vivo (animal) studies, before we begin phase 1 clinical trials in humans.

What’s next:

We have chosen Dengue as our lead candidate, because of the enormous social, economic and health impacts of Dengue.

• Approx. half the world’s entire population is at risk from Dengue
• There are around 450 million cases annually
• Estimated 96 – 126 million symptomatic cases needing treatment (WHO)
• Around 5% of these need hospital care (4.8 – 6.3 million people)
• Dengue is spreading into new regions and causing record outbreaks
• There are currently no approved antivirals for Dengue
• The market is worth NZD$ 2.3 billion annually, and it’s growing

Our Series A capital raise is now open. Please contact us for more details.

 Active Investor Plus Visa: Acceptable Investment
Kimer Med Limited has been assessed against the eligibility criteria by NZTE, and approved as an Acceptable Investment under the Active Investor Plus Visa programme.