Venture Capital Deals At A Glance
Company	Financing
Amolyt Pharma; Lyon, France and Cambridge, MA	The developer of therapeutic peptides for rare endocrine and related diseases said on 16 September that it closed an $80m series B equity financing. Amolyt will use the proceeds for clinical development of AZP-3601 for hypoparathyroidism as well as preclinical development of AZP-3813 for acromegaly and AZP-3404. The company also will expand its early-stage pipeline through internal R&D and may in-license additional drug candidates.
Garuda Therapeutics; Cambridge, MA	Garuda launched on 23 September with $72m in series A financing to fund its development of off-the-shelf blood stem cell therapies that eliminate the need for patients to find a suitable donor to facilitate a blood stem cell transplant as a treatment or cure for more than 70 different diseases, such as hematologic malignancies, sickle cell disease, beta-thalassemia and bone marrow failure diseases.
Hexagon Bio, Inc.; Menlo Park, CA	Hexagon aims to discover medicines encoded in the global metagenome and said on 22 September that it raised $61m to design and develop new drugs mined from microbial genomes. The company is using machine learning, genomics, synthetic biology and automation to discover novel small molecules linked to known protein targets, initially for the treatment of infectious diseases and cancer. Hexagon has raised $108m to date, including a $47m series A round last September. (Also see "Finance Watch: Two New VC Funds Raise $755m To Fund Innovation" - Scrip, 23 September, 2020.)
Anjarium Biosciences AG; Schlieren, Zurich, Switzerland	The Swiss firm revealed on 16 September that it closed a CHF55.5m ($61m) series A financing for the development of non-viral, tissue-targeted gene therapies. Anjarium’s platform combines DNA-based gene vectors, natural and synthetic nanoparticle delivery modalities and low-cost, scalable manufacturing with the goal of producing gene therapies with reduced immunogenicity, increased drug payload capacity, enhanced target delivery and the capacity for repeat dosing. The company will use its funding to advance multiple candidates toward clinical development.
SAB Biotherapeutics, Inc.; Sioux Falls, SD	SAB said on 22 September that it was awarded another $60.5m by the US Department of Defense to expand the scope of the company’s contract with the Joint Program Executive Office for Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Defense (CBRND), Joint Project Lead CBRND Enabling Biotechnologies (JPL-CBRND-EB) for its DiversitAb Rapid Response Antibody Program. The expanded contract will fund advanced clinical development through licensure and commercial manufacturing for SAB-185, SAB’s polyclonal antibody candidate for the treatment of COVID-19. The company is in the process of going public by merging with a special purpose acquisition corporation known as Big Cypress Acquisition Corp. under a deal announced in June. (Also see "Finance Watch: Five Biopharma IPOs Bring US Total To 60 In 2021" - Scrip, 29 June, 2021.)
858 Therapeutics; San Diego	The start-up came out of stealth mode on 21 September with a $60m series A round to develop small molecules against novel drug targets in oncology, such as proteins that regulate RNA and the innate immune response. The new company brings together executives from three firms previously co-founded by Versant Ventures – Jecure Therapeutics (acquired by Genentech, Inc. in 2018), Quanticel Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Celgene Corporation in 2015) and Amira Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb Company in 2011). (Also see "Deal Watch: Boehringer Teams Up In CNS Disorders Again, This Time With Domain" - Scrip, 6 December, 2018.) 858 acquired the three-year-old RNA biology specialist Gotham Therapeutics Corp. for an undisclosed sum to accelerate its development pipeline; the new company plans to take multiple candidates that seek to overcome cancer drug resistance into the clinic with its new cash. (Also see "Gotham Therapeutics Raises $54M Series A To Target RNA-Modifying Proteins" - Scrip, 10 October, 2018.)
Allay Therapeutics; Menlo Park, CA	Allay announced on 15 September that it completed a $60m series C round to fund its development of ultra-sustained products for post-surgical pain management and recuperation. The company will use the proceeds to take lead candidate ATX-101 into a Phase IIb clinical trial in total knee arthroplasties and plans to advance one additional product candidate into the clinic each year.
Ventyx Biosciences, Inc.; Encinitas, CA	Six months after Ventyx raised $114m in equity financing, the company said on 20 September that it closed a $51m series B convertible preferred stock financing to fund its development of new treatments for inflammatory diseases and autoimmune disorders. (Also see "Finance Watch: Cell And Gene Therapy Firms Raised Nearly $20bn In 2020" - Scrip, 18 March, 2021.) The company has three clinical-stage programs: VTX958, a Phase I allosteric TYK2 inhibitor for a broad range of autoimmune diseases; VTX002, a Phase II-ready S1P1 receptor modulator for ulcerative colitis; and VTX2735, a Phase I-ready peripheral inhibitor of the NLRP3 inflammasome.
Elevian, Inc.; Allston, MA	The company disclosed $40m in series A financing on 16 September for its development of treatments and preventive therapies for age-related diseases. Elevian, which has a pipeline of assets related to growth differentiation factor 11 (GDF11), will use the money to submit an investigational new drug (IND) application to the US Food and Drug Administration, build out its manufacturing capacity and complete a Phase I trial for its lead drug candidate to treat stroke.
GenEdit Inc.; South San Francisco	GenEdit is developing genetic medicines for targeted in vivo delivery of curative therapies and said on 23 September that it closed a $26m series A round with Eli Lilly and Company as one of the investors. The company will use the funding to further develop its NanoGalaxy platform for non-viral, non-lipid polymer nanoparticles and to select its first therapeutics candidates for central nervous system diseases.
Bantam Pharmaceutical LLC; Research Triangle Park, NC	The start-up announced on 16 September that it completed a $25m seed financing to finalize IND-enabling activities for its lead drug candidate BTM-3566, submit an IND by February and begin clinical trials in the second quarter of 2022. Bantam is developing drugs that selectively modulate mitochondrial dynamics in cancer; BTM-3566 targets a pathway involved in mitochondrial homeostasis that drives cancer cell apoptosis in solid tumors. The company plans to raise a series A round in the fall of 2021.
Opus Genetics; Raleigh, NC	The Retinal Degeneration Fund (RD Fund), the venture capital arm of the Foundation Fighting Blindness, launched Opus Genetics on 22 September to develop gene therapies for orphan inherited retinal diseases. The RD Fund led a $19m series A round for Opus with participation from the Manning Family Foundation and Bios Partners. This is the RD Foundation’s first spin-out company and it will advance the research of scientists at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) and Harvard University, including two gene therapy candidates licensed from Penn for Leber congenital amaurosis. The first program, OPGx-001, is expected to enter the clinic in mid-2022.

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