Japanese-founded Regcell Inc. has raised $45.8 million and is redomiciling to the U.S. to accelerate clinical development of its pioneering regulatory T-cell (Treg) platform for autoimmune diseases and transplantation.
Leading pharma companies have pitched into Sofinnova Partners’ new accelerator fund, which has exceeded the target and closed at €165 million (US$180 million). In what is said to be the largest pan-European biotech accelerator fund, Amgen Inc., Bristol Myers Squibb Co. and Pfizer Ventures will get an inside track on startups formed around academic research, as the nascent companies are shaped up for formal investment rounds.
Astellas Pharma Inc. is setting up a joint venture with Yaskawa Electric Corp. to develop a new cell production platform using Yaskawa’s dual-arm humanoid robot called Maholo.
Antibody-drug conjugate (ADC)-focused Callio Therapeutics debuted on March 3 with the closing of a $187 million series A financing round based on cancer drug technology and assets in-licensed from Hummingbird Bioscience Pte Ltd.
HBM Alpha Therapeutics Inc. signed a potential $395 million licensing deal Feb. 26 with an unnamed “business partner” for its endocrine asset, HAT-001, adding another contender to the congenital adrenal hyperplasia space.
Ligachem Biosciences Inc. landed another exclusive licensing deal to develop and commercialize antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), this time with T-cell receptor therapy specialist Daan Biotherapeutics Inc. for a cancer-targeting antibody.
Biomissile Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd. is developing multispecific antibodies that overcome resistance associated with antibody-drug conjugates via its next-generation natural killer (NK) cell engagers. “ADCs are very efficacious, but they do have a drawback with side effects and resistance, because ultimately ADCs are similar to chemotherapy because you bring toxins to the tumor site,” Biomissile co-founder and CEO Chao Tu told BioWorld.
Newco Akribion Therapeutics GmbH has raised €8 million (US$8.3 million) in a seed round to develop a new and potent class of RNA-targeted CRISPR nucleases, which, rather than cleaving specific nucleic acids, can destroy every type of nucleic acid in a cell.
Harness Therapeutics Ltd. has raised fresh financing to further develop its technology for upregulating the translation of mRNA into proteins, and in particular to take on a previously undruggable target in Huntington’s disease.
Newco Linkgevity Ltd. has won backing from the KQ Labs accelerator program at the Francis Crick Institute in London, enabling it to take forward the lead program, an anti-necrotic drug for treating acute kidney injury, and to further develop its AI-driven system for identifying aging-related therapeutic targets.
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