Circio Holding

Circio Holding ASA (“Circio” or “the Company”) announced, on the 26^th of August 2026, a research collaboration with Full Circles Therapeutics Inc. (“Full Circles”), a Boston-based developer of non-viral, immune-evasive DNA vector technology. The parties will combine circVec with Full Circles’ C4DNA platform, an engineered circular single-stranded DNA (cssDNA) vector designed to avoid innate immune recognition, to establish a non-viral, non-integrating and immune-silent platform for in vivo cell therapy. Full Circles will design and manufacture C4DNA vectors carrying circVec inserts, which Circio will then evaluate in vitro and in vivo for delivery, expression and immunogenicity. No financial terms are disclosed.

Analyst Group’s View on the Full Circles Collaboration

The collaboration engages the payload format rather than the targeting mechanism, and specifically its immunological properties. Circio’s network already includes format-level engagements, with 4basebio on synthetic DNA vectors in 2025 and Tcelltech’s episomal nanoSMAR vector in June 2026, but both rest on double-stranded DNA, which is rapidly recognized by innate DNA-sensing pathways and cleared. Full Circles contributes a single-stranded circular format engineered to evade that recognition, which is the genuinely new element rather than the DNA vector as such. Because C4DNA sets the form of the payload rather than the vehicle that carries it, and still requires an LNP or similar carrier to reach the target cell, the work can be layered onto Circio’s existing LNP engagements with Acuitas and Certest rather than competing with them.

The commercially relevant aspect is re-dosability, which only matters in combination with duration, and it is on duration that circVec is differentiated. Conventional non-integrating RNA systems, whether linear mRNA or synthetic circular RNA delivered by LNP, sustain expression for only days to approx. two weeks. circVec is delivered as a DNA construct, so the cell keeps generating its own circular RNA rather than drawing on a fixed dose, and has demonstrated expression exceeding six months in lymphoid tissue on a single dose. AAV is durable but effectively single-administration, as neutralizing antibodies against the capsid preclude repeat dosing. Circio already positions circVec-DNA as non-integrating and re-dosable, so the contribution of an immune-silent format is not to create that property but to remove the principal constraint on exercising it, namely the innate immune response to the DNA vector itself.

The agreement is the fifth engagement in Circio’s external network directed specifically at in vivo cell therapy, alongside United Immunity, Acuitas, GenAssist and Tcelltech, and the ninth collaboration announced during 2026. That technically independent counterparties continue to select circVec as the expression component of their own platforms is a credible validation signal, but none of the 2026 agreements carry disclosed financial terms.

In summary, Analyst Group views the Full Circles collaboration as a technically coherent addition to Circio’s in vivo cell therapy work, pointing toward the combination of durability and re-dosability that in vivo cell therapy has so far lacked. It nevertheless remains preclinical and without disclosed terms, and cell therapy continues to represent an optionality layer rather than a near-term value driver. The H1-26 report will be published on the 31^st of August, followed by an R&D and corporate update webcast on the 1^st of September, which is set to include new in vivo data in heart and CNS as well as an update on the CAR-T program.