Technical update on delivery of first LIGHT system

RNS Number : 3596V

Advanced Oncotherapy PLC

13 December 2021

 

Prior to publication, the information contained within this announcement was deemed by the Company to constitute inside information for the purposes of Regulation 11 of the Market Abuse (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019/310. With the publication of this announcement, this information is now considered to be in the public domain.

ADVANCED ONCOTHERAPY PLC

("Advanced Oncotherapy" or the "Company")

Technical update on delivery of first LIGHT system

Good progress, despite continuing global supply chain challenges; Medical treatment room construction complete; LIGHT Patient Positioning System installed

First fully operational LIGHT system, capable of accelerating protons at 230 MeV, now expected to occur around the end of Q1 2022

Advanced Oncotherapy (AIM:AVO), the developer of LIGHT, the next-generation proton therapy system for cancer treatment, today provides a technical update on the delivery of its first operational LIGHT system capable of accelerating protons at 230 MeV.

Good progress despite continuing global supply chain challenges

As outlined at the time of the Company's interim results in September 2021, external factors continue to impact the completion of the Company's first LIGHT system, including the global supply chain shortage of technical and electronic components such as semi-conductors . To mitigate potential delays that have resulted from the protracted Covid-19 pandemic overhang, the Company has taken several key actions including:

1.  Instigating supply chain initiatives to identify and use alternative components and suppliers whilst complying to ISO standards and medical device requirements; and

2.  Contracting with key suppliers to recruit additional installation and testing expertise and capacity.

As a result of these successful endeavours, the Company has been able to make good progress with the assembly, verification and validation activities of the LIGHT system. Key ongoing activities at the Company's assembly site in Daresbury, Cheshire, UK, include ultra-high vacuum testing of accelerating units, the conditioning of the Modulator-Klystron Subsystems (which provide high radio-frequency power to the machine to accelerate the proton beam), alignment of additional subsystems in the accelerator line and beam diagnostics, and verification.

Medical treatment room construction complete and LIGHT Patient Positioning System installed

Since the release of the Company's interim results, the Medical Treatment Room ("MTR") required for the clinical treatment of patients with the LIGHT system has been completed at the Company's Daresbury integration site. Subsequently, the necessary permissions have been received to use the MTR with ionising radiation.

Proton therapy requires high accuracy placement (positioning) of the patient, typically with 1 mm tolerance or less. As such, the Company has developed and installed in the MTR a bespoke LIGHT Patient Positioning System (L-PPS) to provide the required accuracy in a compact and efficient system. The L-PPS comprises of a robotic patient positioner for aligning patients in the upright position in a treatment chair, a CT imaging subsystem, an X-Ray imaging subsystem, and computing software and hardware which are important components as proton therapy requires highly accurate placement, imaging, and image processing of patients. The Company is currently testing the L-PPS subsystem and the data collected will be used for clinical commissioning prior to human use.

Pictures of the Medical Treatment Room can be found here .

Update on timing of delivery of LIGHT system

The Company stated in its interim results statement that it was targeting delivery of the first LIGHT system by the end of 2021, but due to external factors impacting the supply chain, this could slip into Q1 2022. The Company today confirms that it now anticipates delivering its first operational LIGHT system around the end of Q1 2022.

Advanced Oncotherapy plc	www.avoplc.com
Dr Michael Sinclair, Executive Chairman	Tel: [phone]
Nicolas Serandour, CEO
Allenby Capital Limited (Nomad and Joint Broker)	Tel: [phone]
Nick Athanas / Liz Kirchner (Corporate Finance) Amrit Nahal / Matt Butlin (Sales and Corporate Broking)
SI Capital Ltd (Joint Broker)
Nick Emerson	Tel: [phone]
Jon Levinson	Tel: [phone]
FTI Consulting (Financial PR & IR)	[e-mail]
Simon Conway / Rob Winder	Tel: [phone]

About Advanced Oncotherapy

Advanced Oncotherapy, a UK headquartered company with offices in London, Geneva, The Netherlands and in the USA, is a provider of particle therapy with protons that harnesses the best in modern technology. Advanced Oncotherapy's team "ADAM," based in Geneva, focuses on the development of a proprietary proton accelerator called, Linac Image Guided Hadron Technology (LIGHT). LIGHT's compact configuration delivers proton beams in a way that facilitates greater precision and electronic control.

Advanced Oncotherapy will offer healthcare providers affordable systems that will enable them to treat cancer with innovative technology as well as expected lower treatment-related side effects.

Advanced Oncotherapy continually monitors the market for any emerging improvements in delivering proton therapy and actively seeks working relationships with providers of these innovative technologies. Through these relationships, the Company will remain the prime provider of an innovative and cost-effective system for particle therapy with protons.

 

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