Transcend Therapeutics Inc. has closed on a series A funding of $40 million for its next-generation compound, methylone, an MDMA analogue, to be developed as a rapid-acting, disease-modifying, non-hallucinogenic treatment for neuropsychiatric conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder.
Maxion Therapeutics Ltd. has raised $16 million in a series A to take forward a new method for drugging G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) and ion channels with antibodies. The technology brings together naturally occurring knottin peptides that are derived from sources such as snake venom and which can engage GPCRs and ion channels, with antibodies that deliver them to these notoriously difficult, shape-shifting targets.
A preclinical data presentation at the American Society of Clinical Oncology Genitourinary Cancers Symposium later this week has prompted Halda Therapeutics Inc. to emerge from stealth and unveil its novel Riptac (Regulated Induced Proximity Targeting Chimera) platform for creating heterobifunctional small molecules designed to kill cancer cells selectively. The New Haven, Conn.-based company has been quietly refining the technology since its formation in 2019 and has already secured $76 million in series A and B rounds.
Aethon Therapeutics Inc. closed a $30 million series A round to develop a novel antibody-based therapeutic strategy for cancer, which relies on the concomitant use of small-molecule covalent inhibitors that form peptide-drug conjugates or beacons.
Accession Therapeutics Ltd. has raised £16.6 million (US$20.3 million) in a series A round, as it prepares to take two targeted oncolytic/payload combination viruses into the clinic. At the same time, the company disclosed that the scientist who devised the tumor-only targeting mechanism is Alan Parker, professor of translational virotherapies at Cardiff University.
Rgenta Therapeutics Inc.’s $52 million in a series A money will let the RNA-focused firm pursue its small-molecule drug efforts “for the next two or three years,” as candidates in cancer and neurology make their ways toward the clinic, said co-founder and CEO Simon Xi. “We’ll go where the science leads us,” he told BioWorld, adding that the cash on hand is sufficient to complete a phase I study.
Cajal Neuroscience Inc., a startup seeking new targets to use in medicines for neurodegeneration, has launched with the completion of a $96 million series A financing led by The Column Group and Lux Capital. The company, inspired by the pioneering work of Santiago Ramón y Cajal, is focused on the "mechanistic, spatial and temporal complexity of neurodegeneration" to determine "how, where and when different mechanisms contribute to disease."
Swiss-American startup Opna Bio SA launched this week with a $38 million series A, a Science paper on one of its targets and a pipeline stretching from preclinical to phase II.
NRG Therapeutics Ltd. has closed a £16 million (US$18.3 million) series A round to take forward programs in Parkinson’s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, after pinning down the target of its brain penetrant small molecules.
Sensorium Therapeutics Inc. closed a $30 million series A round to fund the discovery and development of new psychiatric drugs, inspired by human ethnobotanical practices that date back hundreds or even thousands of years.