Every breakthrough starts with a single discovery. For Angiex, that discovery became a mission: a future where no one should die of cancer.
Founded in 2015 by entrepreneur and physicist Paul Jaminet, Angiex is developing a new class of cancer therapies built on groundbreaking cancer biology discovered by his wife, Dr. Shou-Ching Jaminet, who also serves as an advisor to the company. Today, its lead candidate, AGX101, is advancing through Phase 1 clinical trials with encouraging early results.
We sat down with Paul to discuss Angiex's journey from breakthrough science to the clinic, the milestones that have de-risked the company, and what's next for the business.
Q: Your journey into biotechnology has been anything but conventional. What led you to build Angiex?
A: I started my career as a physicist and worked as an astrophysicist at MIT, Berkeley, and Harvard. In 1996, I left academia to build a software company during the internet boom, and I've considered myself an entrepreneur ever since.
After building a couple of technology companies, I became interested in health. That eventually led to writing a book, starting a blog, and running a health retreat that helped many people improve their lives.
Meanwhile, my wife was a biomedical scientist in the Harvard system studying cancer biology. I told her that if she ever discovered a way to cure cancer, I'd help build the company to bring it to patients.
She did.
We founded Angiex in 2015 with seed funding from Peter Thiel, and we've been building the company ever since. We entered the clinic in 2024, have now dosed 36 patients, and we're getting closer to understanding the best way to use our therapy. It's incredibly rewarding because I believe we're bringing real hope to cancer patients.
Q: What makes Angiex's approach to cancer treatment different?
A: Everything starts with the biology.
My wife's research uncovered something remarkable. The same pathway endothelial cells use to build new blood vessels is also used by tumor cells to invade and metastasize. That means we can target two critical parts of cancer at once: the tumor itself and the blood vessels that support it.
What makes this especially exciting is that this biology is active in growing tissue, which in adults is primarily tumors. That allows us to attack cancer without affecting the rest of the body in the same way.
That discovery was perfectly suited to antibody-drug conjugates, which have become one of the fastest-growing areas in oncology. At Angiex, we've built on that science by developing Nuclear-Delivered Antibody-Drug Conjugates™. Our lead therapy, AGX101, targets TM4SF1, enabling us to attack tumors through multiple mechanisms, including disrupting the tumor's blood supply, activating anti-tumor immunity, and directly killing tumor cells. I believe that's what makes our platform so differentiated.
Q: Looking back, what milestone gives you the most confidence in where Angiex is headed?
A: Every stage has presented a new challenge. First, it was turning a biological discovery into a drug. Then it was navigating the regulatory pathway to reach the clinic. Today, it's about understanding how to optimize treatment and help oncologists use a fundamentally different therapy.
Our Phase 1 study has made steady progress in understanding dosing and learning how to assess efficacy. Recently, we’ve obtained encouraging data on combination therapy with immune checkpoint inhibitors. We’ve also completed a first pass through our dose escalation with excellent tolerability, and we're beginning to see early evidence that AGX101 can stop tumor growth and substantially kill tumor cells. Those are important milestones because they give us confidence that once we get the treatment regimen optimized, we may be able to deliver a significant survival benefit.
At the highest doses we’ve administered, we believe we may be killing 90% or more of tumor cells with a single dose. If that is validated by the new assessment methods we’ve introduced, FDG-PET imaging and circulating tumor DNA, I think doctors and patients will get very excited.
(To know more about the Phase 1 Clinical Trial, please click here.)
Q: You spend a great deal of time speaking with investors. What do you think they often overlook about Angiex?
A: I think many investors underestimate how much we've already de-risked the company.
I sometimes compare it to putting together a jigsaw puzzle. We've already proven many important pieces of the science and the business. The challenge is helping people connect those pieces into the bigger picture before every milestone has been reached.
Innovation always requires conviction. Some investors understandably want certainty before investing, but transformative companies are built long before all the answers are known.
That's why I've really valued the conversations we've had through Keiretsu Forum. We've met a lot of great people, and several have even become investors in Angiex. But what stands out even more is how engaged they remain. They reach out for updates, think about ways they can help, and make introductions that can move the company forward. We're incredibly grateful for that support because it reinforces the idea that investing in early-stage innovation is about more than capital. It's about believing in the vision and helping the company succeed.
Q: What does success look like for Angiex over the next few years?
A: Our immediate goal is to move as quickly as possible towards approval because that's when we can begin helping patients at scale.
We'll start with cancers that have the highest unmet need, but our long-term ambition has always been much bigger. We want to expand into additional indications, reach patients worldwide, and ultimately help every cancer patient who could benefit from this therapy.
If, five years from now, we're helping patients across multiple countries live longer and healthier lives because of the work we're doing today, that would be an extraordinary achievement.
Q: Finally, what's one message you'd like to leave with investors?
A: We're doing important work, and it's incredibly fulfilling. I wake up every morning excited to continue this journey because I know we're working towards something that has the potential to make a real difference.
There's certainly the opportunity to create significant value, but for me, the most meaningful part is knowing that together we're helping bring a transformative therapy to patients who need it.
Our investors become part of that journey. We share our progress as it happens, and I hope more people will join us as we work towards changing the future of cancer treatment.