Matchpoint scores $150m for I&I drugs, and other financings
Matchpoint Therapeutics is preparing to take its oral T cell modulator through proof-of-concept clinical testing in immunology and inflammation (I&I) diseases, with the help of a $150 million Series B financing.
Watertown, Massachusetts-headquartered Matchpoint is focusing its initial efforts on preclinical-stage covalent drug candidate MPT-062, which it thinks could be a first-in-class therapy for autoimmune and inflammatory diseases.
The company – which was formally launched in 2022 by experts in covalent chemistry, proteomics, and computational sciences from Stanford University and Harvard Medical School – previously raised $30 million in seed financing and $70 million in a Series A. It has been built around a drug discovery platform, ACE, that draws on covalent chemistries to come up with compounds that are designed to offer improved potency, greater selectivity, and lower systemic exposure.
Last year, Matchpoint caught the attention of Novartis, which took an option on an unidentified oral covalent inhibitor directed at a transcription factor linked to inflammatory diseases in a deal that came with an upfront payment of $60 million and up to $1 billion in milestone payments.
The financing was co-led by Nextech Invest and Norwest, with participation from new backers Invus, BB Biotech, T1D Fund, and BOLD Longevity Growth. Founding investors Access Biotechnology and Atlas Venture, along with lead Series A investor Sanofi Ventures, Digitalis Ventures, and all other existing investors also participated.
Also this week
KymaThera has pocketed $80 million in Series B financing that is earmarked for clinical testing of lead candidate K-1728, an oral, pan-mutant selective PI3Kα inhibitor, which is being developed as a monotherapy and in combination regimens for HR-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer, and also as a monotherapy for PI3Kα-driven vascular malformations.
The San Diego biotech expects to start patient dosing in a phase 1 study before the end of the year, and reckons K-1728 can overcome tolerability challenges with existing drugs in the class like Novartis' Piqray (alpelisib) and Roche's Itovebi (inavolisib). The second round was led by Alta Partners, with participation from Venrock, Foresite Capital, J Wood Capital and others, and takes the total raised by KymaThera so far to more than $100 million.
Angelini Ventures and EIB co-led a $58 million Series A financing in Italian biotech Rouge Therapeutics, providing financial resources for its potentially first-in-class treatment for hereditary haemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT), the second most common inherited bleeding disorder which leads to recurrent nose and gastrointestinal bleeding and can lead to other consequences like iron deficiency, chronic anaemia, and organ damage.
RTX-001 is an oral, small-molecule drug designed to restore the integrity of pericytes – cells that support and stabilise blood vessels – and the new cash will be used to advance it into human trials. The round was also supported by BioGeneration Ventures (BGV), Kurma Partners, Epidarex Capital, Vesalius Biocapital Partners, ROM-Utrecht Region, p53 Invest, and Kerna Ventures.
UK startup Sensible Biotechnologies has raised $47 million in financing, which included a Series A led by Oxford Science Enterprises and up to $20 million in non-dilutive funding from the government of Slovakia and the EU. The Oxford-based company will use the proceeds to scale its AI-enabled platform for designing mRNA medicines and making them in engineered living cells. Using cells reduces the need for specialise draw materials and lowers the risk of introducing manufacturing impurities (double-stranded RNA) that can cause medicines to cause immune reactions.
New investors OTB Ventures and In-Q-Tel joined the round, alongside existing backers Recode Ventures, Isomer Capital, Y Combinator, Backed VC, Kaya VC, Civilization Ventures, and BlueYard Capital. There was also buy-in from the office of BioNTech co-founder Christoph Huber, former Eli Lilly chief medical officer Tim Garnett, and other individual investors.
Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Arboretum LifeSciences launched this week with $30 million in Series A funding, which will be used to extend the reach of genetic testing for diseases and develop new tools to help pharma companies select genomically stratified subjects for clinical trials.
Arboretum integrates clinical genetic testing with AI and longitudinal health data to expand access to genomics, whilst also creating molecular registries for translational research, clinical trials, and personalised care pathways. The round was led by F-Prime, GV, .406 Ventures, Hims & Hers, Amgen, and "other premier industry leaders," according to the startup.
