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- PharmAust (PAA) has received a research and development tax refund of more than $700,000 from the ATO
- This refund comes after the ATO recognised the innovation of the research and development being undertaken by PharmAust’s subsidiaries
- The money received will be used to advance the company’s clinical trial programs in dogs and humans
- PharmAust’s share price is down a slight 2.13 per cent in mid-morning trade with shares trading for 9.2 cents apiece
PharmAust (PAA) has received a $712,647 research and development tax refund from the Australian Taxation Office (ATO).
The company says the refund comes after the ATO recognised the innovation of the research and development (R&D) being undertaken by its subsidiaries, Epichem and Pitney Pharmaceuticals.
PharmAust had previously lodged an application with AusIndustry following advice from its consultants that it may qualify for a Research and Development Tax Rebate on its 2019 tax return.
The money received will be used to advance PharmAust’s clinical trial programs in dogs and humans.
PharmAust’s monepantel (MPL) is an oral aminoacetonitrile compound that modulates the mTOR pathway – a key driver of cancer.
A tablet was optimised in the first half of 2019 to enable dosing of pet dogs by their owners and to produce a formula that could be commercialised, and in July PharmAust received ethics approval to reopen the phase II trial.
Dogs with lymphoma were tested as it is one of the most common canine cancers with more than 30 different types. It is also estimated that six million dogs are diagnosed with cancer every year in the United States alone.
In a phase I trial, MPL was shown to be well tolerated and reported beneficial to quality of life in dogs with cancer doses up to 25/mg/kg daily.
In a phase II pilot program, dogs diagnosed with lymphoma were treated with MPL as front-line therapy with doses up to 25mg/kg/day for two weeks before transitioning to standard therapy.
Results showed that 100 per cent of dogs diagnosed with B-cell lymphoma developed stable disease and showed evidence of tumour regression with minimal side-effects.
MPL has also been evaluated in a phase I clinical trial in humans with the principal endpoint to assess the safety of 5mg/kg of liquid MPL an an anticancer drug in patients with refectory metastatic cancer.
Analysis showed that MPL treatment was well-tolerated with only minor adverse events reported.
Pharmacodynamic analysis revealed treatment was associated with a significant reduction in two key biomarkers associated with the disease.
Clinical assessment showed that of the four patients who completed the trial, three were categorised as having stable disease and one as having progressive disease.
The R&D Tax incentive scheme is a program jointly administered by the ATO and AusIndustry, under which companies can receive up to a 43.5 per cent refundable tax offset of eligible expenses on R&D activities.
PharmAust’s share price is down a slight 2.13 per cent in mid-morning trade with shares trading for 9.2 cents apiece at 11:41 am AEDT.
