As the opening of the European Society for Medical Oncology Annual Meeting (ESMO 2023), Europe's largest cancer conference, draws near, attention here is focused on Korean participants.

Along with the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) and the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR), ESMO is one of the world's top three cancer societies. This year's event will be held in Madrid for five days from Oct. 20 to 24.

According to industry sources, Yuhan Corp., Hanmi Pharm, Celltrion, Lunit, MedPacto, HLB, Curocell, Sillajen, TiUM Bio, GI Innovation, Voronoi, ABL Bio, PharmAbcine, Autophagy Science, SN BioScience, ImmuneOncia, Qurient, Eone Diagnomics, Therapex, CytoGen, and FutureChem, will participate in the event or release their study results, directly or indirectly.

HLB will be attending this year's event with its U.S. subsidiary, Elevar Therapeutics. It will also have its booth. HLB, which submitted a marketing authorization application to the U.S. FDA in May for its targeted cancer drug, rivoceranib, as a first-line treatment for liver cancer, intends to explore partnership opportunities for its distribution and sale in Europe during the conference.

TiUm Bio will present top-line results from its phase 1a clinical trial of TU2218, an oral immuno-oncology candidate. TU2218 is a dual inhibitor of transforming growth factor (TGF)-ß and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). The company conducted a phase 1 study of TU2218 alone in patients with advanced solid tumors in the U.S. and Korea. The presentation will be made by Professor Oh Do-youn of the Department of Medical Oncology at Seoul National University Hospital, who is the principal investigator of the clinical trial.

CytoGen will showcase its polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based liquid biopsy prostate cancer diagnostic technology. The company expects its technology to show higher sensitivity than existing immunofluorescence staining diagnostic technologies while minimizing the burden on patients compared to tissue biopsy.

Sillajen will present results from a phase 2 study of kidney cancer patients treated with its anticancer virus Pexavec in combination with Regeneron's immuno-oncology drug Libtayo (semiplimab). The company will also present the phase 1 design of BAL0891, a new pipeline acquired from Basilea in Switzerland last year. BAL0891 is a mitotic checkpoint inhibitor (MCI) that simultaneously inhibits TTK and PLK1.

Some will present clinical results from their technology export pipelines through foreign partners.

Yuhan, the developer of the third-generation EGFR TKI lung cancer drug Leclaza (lazertinib), is set to announce global phase 3 results for Leclaza through its global partner Janssen. The U.S. company has been conducting a global trial to approve the combination of its targeted antitumor drug Rybrevant (amivantamab) and Leclaza as a first-line treatment for lung cancer. Janssen announced in September that it had met the primary endpoint of the phase 3 trial.

ABL Bio will have the Chinese biopharmaceutical company and Nasdaq-listed I-Mab announce the interim results of its phase 1 immuno-oncology candidate, ABL111 (TJ-CD4B in I-Mab's development name). ABL111 is a bispecific antibody that simultaneously targets CLDN18.2 and 4-1BB. The Korean and Chinese partners are conducting a phase 1 study for ABL111 in the U.S. and China.

ORIC Pharmaceuticals, a Nasdaq-listed U.S. biopharmaceutical company, will release phase 1a/1b results for VRN07, a drug candidate for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) introduced by Voronoi.