Inhibikase Therapeutics, Inc. announced preliminary outcomes of the Company's discussion with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on the path to approval of IkT-001Pro in blood cancers, the Company's prodrug of the anticancer agent imatinib mesylate. On January 19, 2024, members of the Company along with its medical oncology consultants met with the FDA Review Team from the Division of Hematologic Malignancies to discuss the Company's bioequivalence studies of IkT-001Pro. During the meeting Inhibikase inquired whether additional clinical studies may be needed to seek approval and discussed manufacturing and quality control requirements for approval.

The Review Team acknowledged that the 505(b)(2) pathway appears to be the appropriate pathway for approval of IkT-001 Pro and indicated that, pending formal review of the Company's clinical data, clinical studies completed to date indicate that 600 mg and 800 mg IkT-001Pro provides similar exposures to 400 mg and 600 mg imatinib mesylate, respectively. These preliminary outcomes from the meeting are subject to formal review of the NDA package. The Review Team also discussed the possible difference between IkT-001Pro and imatinib mesylate absorption in the gut and recommended the Company evaluate whether IkT-001Pro and Imatinib mesylate behave differently with respect to certain gut transporters that regulate absorption.

Inhibikase is in alignment with the FDA and is initiating the necessary pre-clinical tests to evaluate this further to ensure that delivery of imatinib by IkT-001Pro mimics imatinib mesylate in all respects. Finally, a number of recommendations were discussed to prevent the mix-up between 001Pro and imatinib mesy mesylate either at the pharmacy or by patients for two drugs delivering the same active ingredient. Nine mild and one moderate treatment-related adverse events have been reported across all enrolled participants taking risvodetinib.

IkT-001Pro is a prodrug formulation of imatinib mesylate and has been developed to improve the safety of the first FDA-approved Abelson (Abl) kinase inhibitor, imatinib (marketed as Gleevec®?). Imatinib is commonly taken for hematological and gastrointestinal cancers that arise from Abl kinase mutations found in the bone marrow or for gastrointestinal cancers that arise from c-Kit and/or PDGFRa/b mutations in the stomach; c-Kit, PDGFRa/b and Abl are all members of the Abelson Tyrosine Kinase protein family. Imatinib delivered as IkT-001Pro was granted Orphan Drug Designation for Stable-Phase CML in September, 2018.