Laurel Venture Capital, a life science focused venture capital fund based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, China, and Alpine Immune Sciences, Inc., a company focused on discovering and developing innovative, protein-based immunotherapies to treat cancer, autoimmune/inflammatory, and other diseases, announced the completion of the sale and transfer of global rights to the S-Nitrosoglutathione Reductase (GSNOR) assets from Alpine to Laurel Venture Capital.

The assets include broad intellectual property around small molecule GSNOR inhibitors, including the most clinically advanced orally active GSNOR inhibitor, cavosonstat, a product candidate for severe asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) demonstrating compelling safety and efficacy in preclinical and clinical studies.

As a result of the transaction, Alpine will receive an upfront payment and is eligible for potential approval milestone and royalty payments. Alpine acquired the GSNOR assets as part of its merger with Nivalis Therapeutics, Inc. in 2017.

GSNOR serves a pivotal role in controlling nitric oxide availability within tissues and plays an important regulatory role in smooth muscle tone, immune function, inflammation and neuronal development. Disregulation of GSNOR has been implicated in disease and studies have shown pharmacologic GSNOR inhibition attenuates lung and systemic inflammation, decreases airspace enlargement in models of COPD and improves bronchoconstriction in asthma.

Following completion of the acquisition, Laurel Venture Capital will incorporate a new entity in China to maintain the acquired assets. The management team of this newly formed entity will work toward expansion of a Phase II clinical study of cavosonstat to a global multi-centre clinical program and explore prospective new indications. This phase II clinical study of cavosonstat will be sponsored by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for severe asthma in the United States.