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Life Sciences Financings and Commentary #25 - September 12, 2020 - September 18, 2020
Financings
Number of deals: 16 & Total capital invested: $755.5M
- Aidoc raised $20M led by Square Peg Capital to develop and commercialize their AI product for radiologists.
- Attralus raised $25M led by venBio to develop new medicines for systemic amyloidosis
- Brightseed raised $27M led by Lewis & Clark AgriFood to use their AI platform to discover and productize phytonutrients.
- Decent raised $10M led by QED Investors to build health insurance plans for small businesses and self-employed professionals.
- Escient Pharmaceuticals raised $77.5M with Sanofi Ventures and Cowen Healthcare Investments co-leading the round to develop new medicines targeting Mas-related GPCRs.
- Finch Therapeuticsraised $90M to take its oral microbiome therapy, CP-101, into late-stage clinical development and registration in chronic Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) and to move two additional programs, for chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection and autistic spectrum disorder (ASD), into the clinic. Great work Mark.
- Hexagon Bio raised $47M led by The Column Group to scale their computational platform for natural products and develop their own internal pipeline of medicines. Congrats Brian.
- Joint Academy raised $23M led by Kinnevik to scale their digital health product for chronic joint pain.
- Lava Therapeutics raised $83M co-led by Sanofi Ventures and Novo Ventures to develop bispecifics for oncology focusing on gamma delta cells.
- Neogene Therapeutics raised $110M from EcoR1 Capital, Jeito Capital, and Syncona to develop cell therapies for solid tumors. Neogene has a high-throughput screening platform to isolate and sequence T-cell receptors (TCRs) from neoantigens in standard tumor biopsies and engineering those sequences into autologous T cells.
- OnCall Health raised $6M led by Base10 Partners to build virtual care software focused on providers.
- Palleon Pharmaceuticalsraised $100M led by Matrix Capital Management to advance their pipeline of glyco-immunology medicines. The company relies on enzymatic sialoglycan degradation to enable a pan-immune antitumor response as a way of helping patients resistant to first-generation immuno-oncology drugs.
- Resolution Therapeutics raised $35M led by Syncona to develop macrophage cell therapies.
- Signifier Medical Technologies raised $10M led by Alan Howard (from Brevan Howard) to develop medical devices to treat snoring.
- Synthekine raised $82M from Canaan Partners, The Column Group, and Samsara Biocapital to develop engineered cytokines in oncology and autoimmunity.
- Totient raised $10M from Mission BioCapital, Sands Capital, Viva Biotech, Kaitai Capital, Tau Ventures, and Jonathan Milner. The company focuses on tertiary lymphoid structures to identify new tissue-specific antigens and develop matching high-affinity antibodies. Congratulations James, Deniz, and Daniele.
Exits
Number of exits: 6 & Total exit value: Over $33B
- Athira Pharma raised $204M in an IPO to develop their pipeline of potential Alzheimer’s medicines - https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1620463/000156459020043758/atha-s1a.htm
- COMPASS Pathways raised $128M in an IPO to develop their psilocybin-based treatments for depression - https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1816590/000162828020013118/compassf-1.htm
- GRAIL is in talks to be acquired by Illumina after filing to go public. Given that GRAIL spun out of Illumina, the deal is very likely to go through for >$6B - https://www.fiercebiotech.com/medtech/illumina-talks-to-reacquire-its-cancer-blood-test-spinout-grail-bloomberg
- Immunomedics was acquired by Gilead ~$21B to gain access to the former’s pipeline of ADCs in particular their approved medicines for 3-line TNBC - https://www.bioworld.com/articles/497741-21b-acquisition-of-immunomedics-strengthens-gileads-oncology-portfolio
- Oncorus filed to raise $86M in an IPO to develop viral immunotherapies for solid tumors - https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1671818/000119312520244199/d818914ds1.htm
- Taysha Gene Therapies filed to raise $125M to develop gene therapies for central nervous system disorders - https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1806310/000119312520247565/d938924ds1a.htm
Deals
Number of deals: 2 & Total deal value: ~$2.1B
- Click Therapeutics and Boehringer Ingelheim announced a partnership valued at more than $500M to collaborate on the development and commercialization of a prescription-based digital therapeutic for schizophrenia. The mobile application, currently called CT-155, uses cognitive and neurobehavioral techniques to reduce the symptoms of schizophrenia, such as cognitive deficits and impaired social functioning. Under the agreement, Boehringer Ingelheim gains exclusive global rights to CT-155. In exchange, Click receives at least $500 million in an up-front payment, development funding and incentives for achieving specified clinical, regulatory and commercial milestones. New York-based Click also will be paid tiered royalties based on annual net sales of the app - https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/boehringer-ingelheim-click-therapeutics-ink-500m-digital-therapeutics-development
- Seattle Genetics announced a deal with Merck to develop and commercialize Seattle Genetics' ladiratuzumab vedotin, currently in phase 2 clinical trials for breast cancer and other solid tumors. Seattle Genetics will receive a $600M upfront payment and Merck will make a $1B equity investment. Seattle Genetics has also granted Merck a license to commercialize tucatinib, for the treatment of HER2-positive cancers outside of the U.S., Canada and Europe. Seattle Genetics will receive $125m upfront - https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/merck-to-pay-seattle-genetics-1-6b-to-ally-breast-cancer-adc
I used to play football a long time ago - I had some decent success mainly because of my teammates with some of them playing in the NFL. Every practice, every game was an existential fight. I’m not that athletic so every year some 6’4 monster would show up trying to take my spot. Similarly, all of these companies are fighting for their right to exist whether they raised $1M or $100M. Building a great business requires passion and focus. A really powerful and useful framework to lead groups of people and win was developed by Bill Walsh -