September 7, 2016
By Mark Terry, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
Cambridge, Mass.-based Proclara Biosciences, formerly named NeuroPhage Pharmaceuticals, announced today that it had raised $47 million in Series E financing. The financing round was led by existing investors, which include private investors and Merieux Development.
The company came out of Harvard University in 2007, founded by Jonathan Solomon and Hampus Hillerstrom. It has raised $110 million from Merieux, Shire , and other investors, including the founder of Smedvig Capital, Peter Smedvig. According to the company’s president and chief executive officer, Franz Hefti, Shire is no longer involved.
In addition to the financing, Proclara announced that it had started a Phase Ib clinical trial of NPT088 for Alzheimer’s disease. The financing will support the clinical development of the drug.
“We are very pleased by the continued support of our investors, which speaks to the strength of our science and the tremendous potential for our therapies to transform the treatment landscape for patients suffering from Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases,” Hefti said in a statement. “Together with our name change, this important corporate milestone marks our continued progress towards bringing to market a new class of medicines to address the urgent needs of patients suffering from debilitating protein misfolding diseases.”
As a part of the financing round, Daniel Lynch, a venture partner at Third Rock Ventures, was appointed executive chairman of the company’s board of directors. Nick Leschly, chief executive officer of bluebird bio , was also appointed to the board of directors.
The company changed its name in part to signal that is shifting into being a clinical-stage company. Proclara focuses on misfolded proteins. The company’s proprietary General Amyloid Interaction Motif (GAIM) platform allows it to target multiple misfolded proteins simultaneously, whereas most research focuses on a single type of misfolded protein.
Alzheimer’s research is an incredibly risky area of drug development, with more than 125 drugs already having failed in late-stage trials. Currently Biogen is expecting data from its aducanumab Phase III trial, with completion expected in 2018. Eli Lilly has solanezumab, which failed an earlier trial, but is currently being evaluated in patients with an earlier stage of Alzheimer’s. The company expects data later this year.
Proclara is focusing on two types of misfolded proteins in Alzheimer’s, beta amyloid and tau. According to the company’s chief scientific officer, Richard Fisher, NPT088 is expected to clear excess deposits of tau and beta amyloid in the brain. Preclinical work has also indicated it may help clear tangles of alpha synuclein from the brain, which is a protein related to Parkinson’s disease.
So far NPT088 has only been studied in healthy volunteers. The new trial will be the first evaluation of the drug in Alzheimer’s patients. Proclara is planning to enroll up to 66 patients with likely Alzheimer’s disease, based on cognitive decline, and brain scans showing amyloid and tau deposits.
If the study shows positive results, Proclara expects to push the drug into two more complex studies, one in Alzheimer’s and the other in Parkinson’s. Those studies will evaluate not only whether the drug clears tau and amyloid deposits, but if it slows the diseases’ progression.
