Avacta Group plc

("Avacta" or the "Company")

The pre|CISION^® Platform Wins Research and Development Achievement Award from Pharma Industry Awards UK 2026

LONDON and PHILADELPHIA - September 25, 2026 - Avacta Therapeutics (AIM: AVCT, the "Company", "Avacta"), a life sciences company developing innovative, targeted oncology drugs, today announces its pre|CISION^® Platform has been honored by the Pharma Industry Awards UK 2026, winning the Research and Development Achievement Award.

The award recognizes that Avacta is pioneering the development of pre|CISION^® to transform the landscape of targeted cancer therapies. It cites Avacta's achievement of unprecedented milestones in research and development (R&D) over the last 12 months, demonstrating the platform's potential to transform oncology treatment paradigms.

Christina Coughlin, CEO of Avacta, commented:

"We are delighted the pre|CISION^® platform has received this honor as our scientists and clinicians have worked tirelessly to move the Next Gen pipeline forward and moved the first candidate, AVA6103, into the clinic with record speed.  We are thrilled with the recognition of their efforts and the true innovation of the Next Gen pre|CISION^® platform, which is designed to deliver highly potent anticancer payloads directly to the tumor, sparing the toxic effects in normal tissues. 

"Our recent clinical data with AVA6103 point to the proof of this mechanism and we look forward to continued updates on the program and our full pipeline. We are grateful to the patients who are participating in the AVA6103 FOCUS-01 trial and for this recognition of our efforts from the Pharma Industry Awards UK 2026."

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About Avacta - https://avacta.com/

Avacta Therapeutics is a clinical-stage life sciences company expanding the reach of highly potent cancer therapies through its proprietary pre|CISION® platform. pre|CISION® is a payload delivery system based on a tumor-specific protease (Fibroblast Activation Protein or FAP) that is designed to concentrate highly potent payloads in the tumor microenvironment while sparing normal tissues. Avacta's innovative pre|CISION® peptide drug conjugates (PDC) are a novel entry to the XDC drug class, leveraging the success of antibody drug conjugates with alternative methods of delivery beyond antibodies.

Our pre|CISION® PDCs leverage this tumor-specific release mechanism in a small molecule format to provide unique benefits over traditional antibody drug conjugates (ADC), releasing active payload in the tumor and reducing systemic exposure and toxicity which enables dosing to be optimized to deliver the best outcomes for patients. The lead clinical program is AVA6103, a Next Generation FAP-enabled controlled release pre|CISION® version of exatecan that delivers the payload directly in the tumor with limited peripheral blood exposure and is currently in clinical development as a treatment for tumor types sensitive to exatecan including cervical cancer, HR+ breast cancer, small cell lung cancer, gastric cancer, colorectal cancer and pancreatic cancer.

About AVA6103 (FAP-Exd)

AVA6103 is the second clinical candidate and is the first asset in the pipeline based on the Next Generation innovative pre|CISION® controlled release mechanism that provides for prolonged release of payload directly in the tumor, minimizing systemic exposure. AVA6103 is being evaluated in the FOCUS-01 Phase 1 trial (F AP-Exd in O ncologic C ancers with U nmet needS). Preclinical data suggest this approach has optimized payload delivery with a high intratumoral concentration and prolonged exposure of released payload in the tumor, coupled with limited systemic exposure to the released payload.