Zag Bio Inc. came out of stealth mode with $80 million in funding so far, including a recently closed series A financing, to develop its platform for autoimmune diseases using drugs targeted to the thymus where thymic regulatory cells are produced.
Private equity firm GHO Capital raised more than €2.5 billion (US$2.9 billion) for its latest fund to invest in health care companies. The fund, GHO Capital IV LP, is the firm’s largest to date and comes despite a challenging market environment reflecting confidence from investors in GHO’s transatlantic strategy and proven record of outperformance across the health care ecosystem.
Ena Respiratory Pty Ltd. raised an AU$34 million (US$22.4 million) series B round to advance INNA-051, its nasal spray for symptomatic viral respiratory infections, to phase II trials. New investors in the Melbourne-headquartered company include the Gates Foundation and Flu Lab. Existing investors Brandon Capital, Uniseed and Stoic Venture Capital also participated in the round.
Maplight Therapeutics Inc.’s pricing of a $258.9 million financing this week revived the debate over whether targeting the M1 as well as the M4 muscarinic receptor – as Bristol Myers Squibb Co. does with U.S. FDA-approved Cobenfy (xanomeline and trospium chloride) for schizophrenia – is a better strategy than going after M4 alone.