Kite Announces Landmark Study of Refractory Aggressive Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma (SCHOLAR-1) Outcomes Published in the Journal BLOOD

• Retrospective Study Includes 636 Patients with Refractory Aggressive Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma from Four Major Institutional Databases
• Findings Highlight Need for New Therapeutic Options as Patients Achieved Only a 7 Percent Complete Response Rate and Median Overall Survival of 6.3 Months with Currently Available Therapies

SANTA MONICA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Kite Pharma, Inc., (Nasdaq:KITE), a leading cell therapy company, today highlighted the publication of the first large-scale multi-institutional analysis of outcomes of patients with refractory aggressive non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) in the latest electronic edition of BLOOD. The study, SCHOLAR-1 (Retrospective Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma Research), showed outcomes in patients with refractory aggressive NHL subtypes including diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), transformed follicular lymphoma (TFL) or primary mediastinal B-cell lymphoma (PMBCL) following treatment with currently available therapies:

• Objective response rate of 26 percent
• Complete response rate of 7 percent
• Median overall survival of 6.3 months

These findings highlight the unmet medical need and provide an important benchmark for studies that address this refractory patient population.

"SCHOLAR-1 demonstrates the uniformly poor treatment outcomes for patients with aggressive non-Hodgkin lymphoma and emphasizes the need for breakthrough therapies for these refractory patients," said Christian Gisselbrecht, MD, Professor of Hematology, Saint Louis Hospital at Diderot University Paris 7, and corresponding author of the study. "Although 60 to 70 percent of non-Hodgkin lymphoma patients survive five years after rituximab-based chemotherapy and autologous stem cell transplant, nearly half of them either do not respond or relapse shortly after transplant. SCHOLAR-1 provides a rigorous measure of outcomes for these patients who do not benefit from currently available therapies, and this landmark study will serve as an important historical control for evaluating new therapeutic candidates in the field of non-Hodgkin lymphoma."

Key points and findings:

• SCHOLAR-1 uses pooled, patient-level data from two of the largest randomized controlled studies in NHL, the Canadian Cancer Trials Group study Ly.12 and the Lymphoma Academic Research Organization (LYSARC) Collaborative Trial in Relapsed Aggressive Lymphoma (CORAL) study, and from two observational cohorts from MD Anderson Cancer Center and the Molecular Epidemiology Resource of the University of Iowa/Mayo Clinic Lymphoma Specialized Program of Research Excellence (IA/MC).
• The analysis includes 636 patients who met criteria for refractory DLBCL, TFL and PMBCL. Refractory status was defined as progressive disease or stable disease as best response to last chemotherapy, or relapse ≤12 months post-ASCT.
• While patients with relapsed/refractory NHL, a more broadly defined patient population studied in Ly.12 and CORAL, have heterogeneous outcomes to subsequent therapy, the subgroup of patients with strictly refractory NHL, as studied in SCHOLAR-1, have uniformly poor outcomes and greater unmet need.
• In the refractory NHL patient pool studied in SCHOLAR-1, objective response rate was 26 percent, complete response rate was 7 percent, and median overall survival was 6.3 months.
• Outcomes for the refractory NHL patient pool studied in SCHOLAR-1 were consistently poor across patient subgroups.

SCHOLAR-1 was funded through an unrestricted grant from Kite.

About Kite

Kite is a biopharmaceutical company engaged in the development of innovative cancer immunotherapies with a goal of providing rapid, long-term durable response and eliminating the burden of chronic care. The company is focused on chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) and T cell receptor (TCR) engineered cell therapies designed to empower the immune system's ability to recognize and kill tumors. Kite is based in Santa Monica, CA. For more information on Kite, please visit www.kitepharma.com. Sign up to follow @KitePharma on Twitter at www.twitter.com/kitepharma.

Cautionary Note on Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements for purposes of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The press release may, in some cases, use terms such as "predicts," "believes," "potential," "proposed," "continue," "estimates," "anticipates," "expects," "plans," "intends," "may," "could," "might," "will," "should" or other words that convey uncertainty of future events or outcomes to identify these forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding intentions, beliefs, projections, outlook, analyses or current expectations concerning, among other things: the potential to advance improved therapeutic options to treat aggressive NHL. Various factors may cause differences between Kite's expectations and actual results as discussed in greater detail in Kite's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including without limitation in its Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2017. Any forward-looking statements that are made in this press release speak only as of the date of this press release. Kite assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, after the date of this press release.

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KITE CONTACT:Christine CassianoSVP, Corporate Communications & Investor Relationsccassiano@kitepharma.comorGreg MannVP, Investor Relationsgmann@kitepharma.com

Source: Kite Pharma, Inc.

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