02 February 2021

Avacta Group plc

("Avacta" or "the Group" or "the Company")

Issue of Equity

Avacta Group plc (AIM: AVCT), the developer of innovative cancer therapies and diagnostics based on its proprietary Affimer® and pre|CISION™ platforms, today announces that, following the exercise of share options by Bach Biosciences LLC ("Bach"), it has issued and allotted in total 580,791 new ordinary shares of 10 pence each in the Company ("Ordinary Shares"). The exercise by Bach follows the successful submission of the Clinical Trial Application to the UK Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency for AVA6000 Pro-doxorubicin on 23 December 2020. The exercise also reflects Avacta's ongoing, close collaboration with Professor William Bachovchin to develop a pipeline of pre|CISION chemotherapies based on the FAP sensitive substrate developed by Professor Bachovchin at Tufts University School of Medicine and exclusively licensed by Avacta.

Application will be made for the Ordinary Shares to be admitted to trading on AIM and dealings are expected to commence on 8 February 2021. The Ordinary Shares will rank pari passu with the existing Ordinary Shares of the Company.

Following Admission, the Company's enlarged issued share capital will be 253,236,345. This figure may be used by shareholders in the Company as the denominator for the calculations by which they will determine if they are required to notify their interest in, or a change in their interest in, the share capital of the Company under the FCA's Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rules.

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For further information from Avacta Group plc, please contact:

About Avacta Group plc - https://www.avacta.com

Avacta Group is developing novel cancer immunotherapies and powerful diagnostics based on its two proprietary platforms - Affimer^® biologics and pre|CISION™ tumour targeted chemotherapies.

The Affimer platform is an alternative to antibodies derived from a small human protein. Despite their shortcomings, antibodies currently dominate markets, such as diagnostics and therapeutics, worth in excess of $100bn. Affimer technology has been designed to address many of these negative performance issues, principally: the time taken to generate new antibodies and the reliance on an animal's immune response; poor specificity in many cases; their large size, complexity and high cost of manufacture. 

Avacta's pre|CISION targeted chemotherapy platform releases active chemotherapy in the tumour, which limits the systemic exposure that causes damage to healthy tissues, and thereby improves the overall safety and therapeutic potential of these powerful anti-cancer treatments. 

The Group comprises two divisions: The therapeutics development activities are based in Cambridge, UK and the Group is generating near-term revenues from Affimer reagents for diagnostics, bioprocessing and research, through a separate diagnostics business unit based in Wetherby, UK.

Avacta's Diagnostics Division works with partners world-wide to develop bespoke Affimer reagents for third party products. The Company is also developing an in-house pipeline of Affimer-based diagnostic assays including the AffiDX^TM SARS-CoV-2 Lateral Flow Rapid Antigen Test and a BAMS^TM SARS-CoV-2 Assay in partnership with Adeptrix Inc.

Avacta's Therapeutics Division is addressing a critical gap in current cancer treatment - the lack of a durable response to current immunotherapies experienced by most patients. By combining its two proprietary platforms the Company is building a wholly owned pipeline of novel cancer therapies deigned to be effective for all cancer patients. In 2021 Avacta will commence a phase 1 first-in-human, open label, dose-escalation and expansion study of AVA6000 Pro-doxorubicin, the Company's lead pre|CISION^TM prodrug, in patients with locally advanced or metastatic selected solid tumours.

Avacta has established drug development partnerships with pharma and biotech, including a research collaboration with Moderna Therapeutics Inc., a deal with LG Chem worth up to $400m, a partnership with ADC Therapeutics and a collaboration with Point Biopharma to develop radiopharmaceuticals based on the pre|CISION^TM platform. Avacta actively seeks to license its proprietary platforms in a range of therapeutic areas.

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About Bach Biosciences LLP

Bach Biosciences LLP is the mission-driven development company associated with Dr. William Bachovchin's laboratory at Tufts University School of Medicine. Bach Biosciences is accelerating breakthrough discoveries into therapeutics for patients, from its own drug development pipeline or by working in partnership with other life science companies.  Bach Biosciences' leadership and development team is highly skilled in translational medicine and pharmaceutical development, having had a number of programs move into clinical development and into the marketplace.  The company and its founders have established strategic partnerships with contract research organizations, investors, and pharmaceutical partners to support technology development.  Dr. Bachovchin is the inventor on 46 issued US patents, including reach-through patents covering the field of DPP-IV inhibitors for treating diabetes, a $10B market. This patent has been licensed by Merck, Novartis, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Boehringer Ingelheim. In addition three drugs first designed, synthesized and characterized in Dr. Bachovchin's laboratory at Tufts University School of Medicine have been advanced into human clinical trials.