– IRELAND, Dublin – Priothera Limited, a clinical-stage company developing orally applied sphingosine 1 phosphate receptor modulators for haematological malignancies, today announced the closing of a €30 million Series A financing round co-led by Fountain Healthcare Partners and HealthCap alongside funds managed by Tekla Capital Management, LLC as well as EarlyBird Venture Capital.
Concurrent with the financing, Florent Gros, Dr Dhaval Patel, Dr Manus Rogan, Dr. Mårten Steen, Dr Henry Skinner and Lionel Carnot, have joined the Board of Directors.
Priothera will use the funds to progress the clinical development of mocravimod, a modulator of sphingosine 1 phosphate receptors, to enhance the curative potential of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for treating AML. Priothera expects to generate further randomized clinical data in high-risk AML patients with this Series A funding round.
Mocravimod has already been extensively tested in multiple immunologic indications and has shown a survival benefit in an early clinical study evaluating acute myeloid leukaemia and acute lymphocytic leukaemia patients undergoing hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Priothera acquired mocravimod from KYORIN Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.
Florent Gros, Co-Founder and CEO of Priothera, commented, “We are delighted to welcome this terrific syndicate of investors, who share our passion, commitment, and vision for advancing Priothera’s potentially best-in-class new therapy, mocravimod, in patients with acute myeloid leukaemia and other hematologic malignancies. Allogenic stem cell transplant is the only potentially curative approach for AML patients but has unacceptably high mortality with current treatments. We are excited about mocravimod which has a unique mechanism of action and clinical proof of concept demonstrating its ability to improve survival outcomes for this devastating disease.”
Dr Dhaval Patel, Co-Founder and Board Director of Priothera, who previously led Research Europe and the Autoimmunity, Transplantation and Inflammation Disease Area at Novartis, known for its success in developing other S1P receptor modulators, stated, “Mocravimod is an outstanding, well-characterized and well-behaved S1P receptor modulator that is well-suited for clinical development and commercial manufacturing. Based on the clinical results to date, mocravimod has the potential to be a best-in-class therapy to decrease the morbidity and mortality associated with HSCT for AML. I have high hopes that Priothera can make an impactful difference for these patients.”
Commenting on the launch of the company, Dr Manus Rogan, Chairman of Priothera added, “The Priothera team has identified and validated a novel commercial opportunity for an S1P receptor modulator allowing the company to complete this significant Series A funding round. With their extensive expertise and capabilities, I am confident that Florent and the team are uniquely placed to successfully generate further clinical data to highlight the significant potential of mocravimod.”
About Priothera
Priothera is leading the way in developing orally applied sphingosine 1 phosphate receptor modulators for haematological malignancies. S1P receptor modulators have been suggested to largely reduce egress of T cell subsets from lymphatic tissues allowing for dual inhibition of graft-versus-host-disease and enhancing graft-versus-leukaemia benefits in patients receiving allogeneic stem cell transplant.
Headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, Priothera was founded in 2020 by Drs. Florent Gros and Dhaval Patel. Joining the founding team are the experienced industry executive, Dr Christoph Bucher, Dr Simone Seiter, and Brice Suire.
Founding investors are Fountain Healthcare Partners (Dublin, Ireland), funds managed by Tekla Capital Management, LLC (Boston, Massachusetts), HealthCap (Stockholm, Sweden) and Earlybird Venture Capital (Berlin, Germany).
For more information: https://priothera.com/
About Fountain Healthcare Partners
Fountain Healthcare Partners is a life science focused venture capital fund with EUR 300 million (USD 354 million) under management. Within the life science sector, specific areas of interest to Fountain include speciality pharma, medical devices, biotechnology and diagnostics. The firm deploys the majority of its capital in Europe, with the balance in the United States. Fountain’s main office is in Dublin, Ireland, with a second office in New York.
For more information: http://www.fh-partners.com/
About HealthCap
HealthCap is a family of venture capital funds investing globally in life sciences. With more than EUR 1 billion raised since the start in 1996, HealthCap is one of the largest specialized providers of venture capital within life sciences in Europe. The investment strategy focuses on diseases with high unmet medical needs and breakthrough therapies that have the potential to be transformative and change medical practice, and the lives of patients suffering these conditions. Over the years HealthCap has backed and built more than 100 companies, taken more than 40 companies public and done numerous trade sales.
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