Electra banks $183m for sHLH drug, and other biofinancings
Electra Therapeutics has garnered the funds it needs to complete a pivotal trial of its lead drug, angling to become the first approved therapy for rare inflammatory disease secondary hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (sHLH).
The $183 million Series C is earmarked for Electra's phase 2/3 trial of anti-SIRP-antibody ELA026 in sHLH, a hyperinflammatory disease that is triggered by another illness, such as an infection, autoimmune disease, or cancer, with sepsis-like symptoms that can be life-threatening.
The pivotal study is enrolling patients at research sites across the US and Europe and recently started dosing, said Electra in a statement. ELA026 has fast-track and breakthrough status from the FDA as well as a PRiME designation from the EMA for sHLH, based on phase 1b results, which showed a 100% overall response rate, improved survival, and a favourable safety profile in patients whose disease was triggered by cancer.
The money will also go towards a secondary effort to develop ELA026 for blood cancers – arguably more familiar territory for the SIRP inhibitor class – and for ELA822, a second SIRP-targeted programme for T-cell mediated autoimmune diseases currently in preclinical development.
The financing was co-led by Nextech and EQT Life Sciences, with participation from additional new investors, including Sanofi, HBM Healthcare Investments, and Mubadala Capital, alongside existing backers. South San Francisco-based Electra's earlier rounds included an $84 million Series B in 2022, shortly after it was spun out of Star Therapeutics.
Other recent funding rounds
Hemab Therapeutics, with operations in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Copenhagen in Denmark, closed a $157 million third-round financing that will help it to prepare for registration trials of sutacimig (formerly HMB-001), a subcutaneously administered bispecific antibody targeting Factor VIIa and TLT-1, encouraging the formation of blood clots.
The round, led by Sofinnova Partners and other new investors, including Avoro Capital Advisors, comes after Hemab completed phase 2 testing in Glanzmann thrombasthenia, setting up its potential to become the first prophylactic therapy for the rare bleeding disorder. Trials in Factor VII deficiency, another rare disease, are scheduled to start next year, and the cash infusion will also help Hemab take its second drug candidate – HMB-002 for von Willebrand disease – into a registration trial next year.
Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Zag Bio emerged from the shadows this week with an $80 million Series A and a mission to develop thymus-targeted medicines for autoimmune diseases, starting with type 1 diabetes. Its platform focuses on stimulating tolerance to autoimmunity by using bifunctional antibodies to expand T regulatory (Treg) cells.
Polaris Partners founded and incubated Zag Bio and co-led the first-round financing with the T1D Fund, backed by Mission BioCapital, AbbVie Ventures, Lightspeed Ventures, Sanofi Ventures, KdT Ventures, Regeneron Ventures, Boxer Capital and Pear VC.
New London, UK startup Elevara Medicines arrived on the scene with $70 million in a first round co-led by Forbion and Sofinnova Partners that will support its efforts to develop an oral CDK4/6 inhibitor, ELV001, as a therapy for rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The drug – licensed from Japan's Teijin Pharma – is due to start the phase 2 START-SYNERGY trial in the next few weeks in RA patients who have not responded to prior treatment with standard-of-care therapies like TNF inhibitors and methotrexate – a hard-to-treat but sizeable part of the RA population.
According to the company, ELV001 has been designed to target fibroblast-like synoviocytes (FLS), which are thought to be a key driver of RA pathology, without affecting the immune system, making it a complementary approach to immune-modulating therapies.
Another new biotech player, Flagship Medicines-incubated Expedition Medicines, has been launched with $50 million to advance a generative AI-based drug discovery platform that will be used to find new small-molecule therapies for cancer and immune diseases. It also starts out with a ready-made partnership with Pfizer, thanks to the pharma group's strategic-level agreement with Flagship.
Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Expedition is focusing on "proteins with smooth surfaces," which lack well-defined binding areas for small-molecule drugs, often considered an undruggable category. It uses an approach that focuses on looking for "quantum interactions" between small molecules and reactive parts of protein surfaces.
Finally, Curve Biosciences raised $40 million in funding, led by Luma Group, that will be used to develop its 'whole-body intelligence' platform for chronic disease monitoring. The company's platform is based around its Whole Body Atlas, which it says is the world's largest collection of manually curated tissue samples characterised by organ and disease state.
Curve – which is led by former Genentech business development head Ritish Patnaik – is deploying the platform to develop tests to "anticipate chronic disease, guide treatment, and align patients, insurers, pharma, and doctors."
