By Kim Coghill

Cytochroma Inc. added US$2.3 million in the second tranche of its Series B private equity financing, bringing the total raised to US$9.9 million.

The first tranche, announced in late October, was for US$7.6 million.

Robert Foldes, Cytochroma¿s president and CEO, told BioWorld Today that proceeds from the financing will be used to advance the company¿s research and development, offset the costs of a planned relocation to a new facility in Toronto, and to enhance the management team.

Cytochroma¿s technology consists of a bioinformatics-based approach to a cytochrome P450 gene discovery called CYP-ID, an integrated process for protein function identification termed Lipidomics, and a novel drug-screening approach named CYP-HIT.

Foldes said the Kingston, Ontario-based company has compounds in preclinical development for psoriasis and oncology. Also, the company has CYP26 inhibitors in the identification stage for dermatology.

This Series B financing included investments by T2C2 Bio/2000 LP, of Montreal, and CDP Sofinov, of Montreal. Others were The Business Development Bank, of Canada (BDC); Novo A/S, of Denmark; GenChem Technologies Venture Fund LP, of Montreal; Canadian Medical Discoveries Fund, of Toronto; Working Ventures Canadian Fund Inc., of Toronto; and VentureLink Capital Corp., of Toronto.

In its Series A financing in February 1999, Cytochroma raised US$1.4 million.

In July, Cytochroma expanded its research, development and license agreement with Allergan Inc., of Irvine, Calif., to develop inhibitors of retinoic acid metabolism. The agreement was initiated in 1999 and takes advantage of Cytochroma¿s knowledge of cytochrome P450 enzymes responsible for the breakdown of retinoic acid in humans, CYP26A and CYP26B.