Rgenix, Inc., a NYC-based clinical stage biopharmaceutical company developing small molecule and antibody cancer therapeutics, raised $40m in Series C financing.
The round was led by Lepu Medical, a publicly traded global healthcare firm, and includes Oceanpine Capital and WuXi AppTec’s Corporate Venture Fund, as well as existing investors Novo Holdings A/S, Sofinnova Partners, Alexandria Venture Investments, LLC, and the Partnership Fund for New York City’s Innovate NY Fund and associated entities.
The company intends to use the funds for further development of its clinical and pre-clinical oncology programs and for general corporate purposes.
The financing will support Phase 1b/2 clinical trials of the lead program RGX-104 in multiple cancer indications, including in checkpoint inhibitor refractory patients. It will also support early clinical development of RGX-202, a cancer metabolism program, as well as discovery stage programs arising from the Rgenix target discovery platform.
Led by Masoud Tavazoie, MD, PhD, and Chief Executive Officer and co-founder, Rgenix is pursuing several first-in-class drug candidates to treat cancers of high unmet need. The company identifies novel cancer targets using a microRNA based target discovery platform originally developed by its scientific co-founders at The Rockefeller University and now exclusively licensed to Rgenix.
It is advancing:
– RGX-104, a first-in-class small-molecule immunotherapy that targets the Liver X Receptor (LXR) and modulates innate immunity by activating the ApoE gene.
– RGX-202, a small molecule compound that suppresses gastrointestinal cancer progression by inhibiting a novel cancer metabolism pathway involved in supplying energy to cancer cells.
FinSMEs
09/10/2018