Cambridge Innovation Capital (CIC), a venture capital investor focused on deeptech and life sciences businesses that secured £225M ($300M) for its oversubscribed second fund – Fund II.l last year is in news again. The VC fund has made its first investment in Complement Therapeutics (CTx), a German biotech startup with lab facilities in Stevenage. The investment was a as part of a €72M Series A round.
The round was led by Belgian European investment company Gimv, and Netherlands-based VC Forbion with participation from another Dutch VC BioGeneration Ventures (BGV), Panakès Partners, Hadean Ventures and Seroba Life Sciences.
Alongside the financing, Michaël Vlemmix (Gimv), Rob Woodman (Panakès), Anne Horgan (CIC) and Roger Franklin(Hadean Ventures) will join the board as new members.
Development of its lead product
The funds will be used to continue the development of its lead product CTx001 and complete a Phase Ib clinical proof of concept, to expand its laboratory-based activities in Stevenage (UK), to evaluate its pipeline assets for non-ocular indications, and to further develop the novel Complement Precision Medicine (CPM) platform.
“With a potentially highly differentiated lead asset combined with a precision medicine approach, we are excited by the opportunity to further develop CTx001 for the treatment of GA through to the clinic.” said Dr Rafiq Hasan, CEO and Managing Director at Complement Therapeutics GmbH. “The support of this broad syndicate enables us to generate additional data demonstrating CTx001’s unique and differentiated mechanism of action, with the potential to transform the treatment landscape in geographic atrophy.”
Michaël Vlemmix, Principal in the Life Sciences platform of Gimv said: “We are proud to have been able to build this syndicate and look forward to supporting Complement Therapeutics in its next phase of development. The company and its team combine deep research insights, strong industry background, and a robust understanding of complement-mediated conditions, in particular GA secondary to AMD. These strengths, coupled with a focus on addressing the significant unmet need in GA, positions the company to change the way the disease is addressed and potentially achieve meaningful therapeutic impact.”
“We are delighted with the rapid progress made by Complement Therapeutics in the last 12 months. Patients impacted by complement-mediated diseases often have to cope with debilitating symptoms throughout their lifetime and this can lead to a significant burden on them and their families. We look forward to supporting the Company as it drives forward a pipeline of novel assets addressing these unmet needs in complement-mediated diseases” said Dr Dmitrij Hristodorov, Partner, Forbion.
Founded in 2020 by Prof Paul Bishop, Prof Simon Clark and Dr Richard Unwin, CTx is a biotechnology company in its early stages that focuses on the discovery and development of new treatments for complement-mediated disorders.
The University of Manchester spinout is focused on research on targets within the complement cascade. An investigational product (CTx001), a highly innovative AAV gene therapy for the treatment of Geograpic Atrophy (GA) secondary to dry age-related macular degeneration (dry-AMD), is being tested as a potential gene therapy for GA, which is a primary cause of blindness. The Complement Precision Medicine (CPM) platform is also being developed by the business to enable the quantification of over 30 complement cascade proteins, allowing for disease diagnosis and monitoring.
