Immunocore has secured up to $40m in investment from Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to boost the development of soluble T-cell receptor (TCR)-based therapeutics to treat infectious diseases, in particular tuberculosis (TB) and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

Immunocore is a UK-based company focused on developing biological therapies for the treatment of cancer, infectious diseases and autoimmune diseases.

The investment will be used by the company to support the development of its immune mobilising monoclonal TCRs against virus (ImmTAV) and immune mobilising monoclonal TCRs against bacteria (ImmTAB) therapeutics for infectious diseases.

The collaboration will help discover and develop ImmTAV and ImmTAB molecules to treat TB and HIV where the TCR-based therapeutics are capable of decreasing treatment timelines and improving patient outcomes.

Immunocore infectious disease unit vice-president Namir Hassan said: "We believe the immune system harbours the capacity to resolve problematic infectious diseases and our TCR based therapies are well placed to mobilise this process.

"Our purpose in the Immunocore infectious disease unit is to revolutionise treatments for diseases such as hepatitis B, tuberculosis, and HIV and provide affordable medicines globally, including in the developing world. This collaboration will be critical to this initiative."

In addition, Immunocore will continue to extend its platform technology to develop therapeutics with wide coverage of the affected disease population.

The partnership is part of the company’s larger initiative to expand its soluble TCR-based therapeutics to areas outside of oncology, including infectious diseases and autoimmune diseases.