Inthera Bioscience raises EUR 3.4 million in seed financing round

Please login or
register
14.12.2015

Inthera Bioscience, a Swiss biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of first-in-class targeted small molecule therapies for solid tumors, today announced the closing of a EUR 3.4m financing round. The funds raised by MS Ventures, Aglaia Oncology Fund II Novo Seeds and EVA Basel will be used to advance Inthera’s oncology programs towards the clinic.

Inthera Bioscience is focused on developing inhibitors of intracellular protein-protein interactions employing a proprietary technology platform. Rationally designed, these molecules display hot spot residues on a non-peptidic backbone merging the versatility of small molecules with the specificity of biologics. The broad applicability of the approach has been illustrated against several targets in oncology. Inthera’s lead programs focus on HPV associated cancers and hypoxia-inducible signaling.

Aberrant cellular signaling is a major cause of cancer development and progression. Blocking protein-protein interactions mediating signal transduction in cancer cells is a highly attractive approach for the development of novel anti-cancer agents. However, with few exceptions, such targets have remained evasive to date. Founded in 2013 by Dr. Ulrich Kessler and Prof. Paramjit Arora, Inthera Bioscience employs a proprietary technology platform to rationally design protein-protein interaction inhibitors. The company has discovered potent disruptors of hypoxia-inducible signaling for the treatment of solid tumors and targeted agents against HPVassociated cancer, which are in pre-clinical development.

Jasper Bos, Senior Investment Director at MS Ventures, commented: “The broad applicability of Inthera’s technology is intriguing. Protein-protein interactions are one of the most promising target classes in oncology but have been notoriously intractable. The possibility to rationally design small molecule inhibitors against them could break new ground in targeted cancer therapy.”

“Inthera is a great fit with Aglaia’s strategy”, said Mark Krul, Partner at Aglaia. “We strongly believe in innovative technology platforms in order to develop truly novel, first-in-class therapies in oncology. Hypoxia-inducible signaling is a major driver of cancer progression and metastasis in many solid tumor types; blocking this pathway has the potential to become a revolutionary therapy.”

Nanna Lüneborg, Investment Director at Novo Seeds, said: “We are delighted to partner with the Inthera team and our co-investors. HPV-associated cancer is an epidemic on the rise and Inthera’s lead program could pioneer a novel, targeted approach to the treatment of these malignancies.

“It is exciting to advance our lead program from in vivo proof of concept to the clinic and expand our emerging pipeline”, said Ulrich Kessler, Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Inthera. “Being supported by such a strong investor syndicate illustrates the potential of our technology and projects. We are looking forward to working with our new board members Jasper Bos, Senior Investment Director at MS Ventures, Mark Krul, Partner at Aglaia, Nanna Lüneborg, Investment Director at Novo Seeds and also with partners from EVA Basel.

(Press release)

0Comments

More news about

Inthera Bioscience AG

Company profiles on startup.ch

Inthera Bioscience AG

rss