On August 9, 2022, Asia Cell & Gene Therapy Innovation Summit 2022 hosted by Taas labs was officially and finally held in Shanghai. This summit has been postponed twice previously because of the pandemic in Shanghai and attracted nearly 800 attendees to the conference.
This two-day event had two parallel sessions, focusing on cell therapy and gene therapy, separately. Over 40 experts presented during the summit and 30+ exhibitions outside the meeting rooms have demonstrated solutions in diverse aspects.
In the cell therapy sub-forum, five companies focusing on developing new therapeutics presented their progress in CAR-NK and TCR-T products. Two topics talked about considerations during the IND application of cell therapies. In the gene therapy sub-forum, in addition to the AAV strategy, there were four talks presenting research on the oncolytic virus. This field has certainly been accelerated by different analytical platforms and new technologies. During the forum, instrument manufacturers and CDMO companies demonstrated diverse . Among all the platforms, Tapestri was the newest one and attracted much attention during the forum.
This was also the first on-site large conference we have participated in China. My presentation subject was Accelerating CGT R&D and Market Access through Single-cell DNA+Protein Multi-Omic Analysis. Here, we linked together the FDA and CDE Guidelines for gene therapy products and CAR-T cell products to the requirement for a comprehensive and detailed characterization of CGT products. This should be taken into consideration during the development of the methods in the early stage and product release tests during the manufacturing phase. The heterogeneity and complexity of edited cells have given our Tapestri Single-Cell Multi-Omics Platform an opportunity to demonstrate its unique capabilities in this field, especially in resolving the co-editing events and quantifying the vector copy number per cell. Thanks to our great PAD team, we have already partnered with many companies in the CGT area and established the first GMP-ready CGT assay.
We also had a booth outside the conference room for a Tapestri platform demonstration and for the audience coming for further communication. All our China colleagues came to this conference to get connected with potential partners and peers in this field. People asked for more detailed information about our technology, inquiring how Tapestri outperformed their current methods and whether it is necessary to implement such intricate technology. I tried to refine their questions and the potential problems they may face in certain scenarios. Tapestri outperformed many traditional assays in accuracy and efficiency. It cannot be replaced by any other methods in multiplex genome editing, which is a trend in cell and gene therapy. This event was a great opportunity for us to share our capacities and meet the CGT community person .
