Cedars-Sinai Medical Center has awarded rights to a preclinical vaccine to prevent recurring brain tumors to StemVax Therapeutics, an emerging biotechnology firm based in Pasadena.

StemVax, a unit of Innovest Global Inc. based in Cleveland, Ohio, announced Aug. 9 it had struck an exclusive license agreement with the Beverly Grove hospital to develop the drug. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

“The StemVax business model is a low cost, high output strategy of partnering with a major health organization to get the technology to market and start helping people,” said Dwain Morris-Irvin, co-founder of StemVax and president of Innovest’s biotech division, in a statement.

StemVax was founded in 2014 and is based at the Pasadena Bio Collaborative Incubator, a laboratory for startup bioscience companies.

Its immunotherapy vaccine aims to prevent a recurrence of glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer that kills most patients within 15 months. A phase I clinical trial is expected to start by 2020, pending federal regulatory approvals.

Health business reporter Dana Bartholomew can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @_DanaBart.