Synosia Therapeutics Raises CHF32 Million in Series B Private Financing

BASEL, Switzerland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Synosia Therapeutics today announced the completion of a CHF32 million (USD 29 million) Series B private financing. The proceeds will be used to fund the ongoing development of its emerging portfolio of phase II clinical programmes.

The financing was led by Aravis Venture and Investor Growth Capital and was joined by Swiss Helvetia Fund. All existing investors - Versant Ventures, Abingworth, Novo A/S and 5am Ventures - also participated in the round.

“We are impressed by the quality and breadth of Synosia’s portfolio of clinical-stage compounds and by the strength of its management team”, said Jean-Philippe Tripet, Managing Partner of Aravis Venture. “It’s rare to see a private biotechnology company with four promising compounds in phase II clinical trials.”

“Of the six clinical-stage compounds acquired from Roche, Novartis and Syngenta, two are already marketed by other companies in non-competing indications”, said Jakob Lindberg, Partner of Investor Growth Capital. “This enables Synosia to build on thousands of years of patient experience, significantly reducing the development risk from a safety perspective.”

As part of this Series B financing, Jean-Philippe Tripet of Aravis, and Gösta Jonsson, independent scientific advisor to Investor Growth Capital, became members of the company’s board of directors.

In addition, Synosia announced that the following joined the board of directors: Guido Magni, formerly head of global medical science and global drug development at Roche for more than 10 years; Harry Welten, Chief Financial Officer of Arpida; Ralf Rosenow, Partner of Blum&Grob Attorneys at Law and Genghis Lloyd-Harris, Partner of Abingworth. Ian Massey, President and Chief Executive Officer of Synosia paid tribute to retiring board members Mark Moran, Hervé Girsault, Brian Atwood and Andrew Sandham: “Their contributions were vital in the early development of the company. Thanks to their efforts, we now have a strong portfolio of clinical-stage assets and a sound strategy to develop our compounds. I am also pleased that Mark Moran will continue to play an important role as our Chief Medical Advisor”.

“With this financing, the company has the necessary financial backing to move its compounds through pivotal phase II clinical trials”, commented Synosia Chairman Brad Bolzon. “The support of a group of premier life science investors clearly validates the quality of this management team and their recent achievements, which is especially gratifying during this uncertain time in the financial markets.”

About Synosia Therapeutics

Synosia Therapeutics develops and intends to commercialise innovative and clinically differentiated products for unmet medical needs in psychiatry and neurology. The privately-owned company has in its pipeline six clinical-stage compounds acquired through key partnerships with Novartis, Roche and Syngenta. Two of the compounds are marketed drugs being tested in new indications to extend their reach into neurological and psychiatric diseases with high unmet medical need, including anxiety and Parkinson’s disease. Synosia’s headquarters is in Basel, Switzerland. For more information visit www.synosia.com

About Aravis Venture

Aravis is a Switzerland based venture capital organisation, managing two funds focused on life science (Aravis Biotech I & II) and a third fund focused on renewable energy (Aravis Energy I). Since 1995, the Aravis management team has invested over $600 million in more than 80 companies. www.aravis.ch

About Investor Growth Capital

Investor Growth Capital is the wholly owned venture capital arm of Investor AB (Investor). Investor, publicly traded on the Stockholm exchange, is the largest listed industrial holding company in Northern Europe. Investor was founded in 1916 to continue the Wallenberg family's tradition of financing and building best-in-class companies. www.investorab.com

About the Swiss Helvetia Fund

Swiss Helvetia Fund is a non-diversified, closed-end investment company whose objective is to seek long-term capital appreciation through investment in equity and equity-linked securities of Swiss companies, listed and non listed. The Fund also may acquire and hold equity and equity-linked securities of non-Swiss companies in limited instances. www.swz.com

Disclaimer

This communication, and oral statements made with respect to information contained in this communication, expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning Synosia Therapeutics and its business. Such forward-looking statements include those which express plan, anticipation, intent, contingency, goals, targets or future development and/or otherwise are not statements of historical fact including, but not limited to our plans for our regulatory filings, enrolment and future plans for our clinical trials, progress of and reports of results from clinical studies, clinical development plans and product development activities. The words “potential”, “could” and similar expressions also identify forward-looking statements. These statements are based upon management's current expectations and are subject to risks and uncertainties, known and unknown, which could cause actual results and developments to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. Factors that could affect actual results include risks associated with the possibility that the respective regulatory agencies refuse approval of our applications, the outcome of any discussions with such regulatory agencies and unexpected delays in preparation of materials for submission to such respective regulatory agencies as a part of our filings.

Synosia Therapeutics is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Actual events could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements.

Contact:

For Synosia Therapeutics Tudor Reilly Julie Walters Tel: +44 1494 753 990 Mobile: +44 775 3626967 julie.walters@tudor-reilly.com or In the US Michele Parisi Tel: +1 925 864 5028 michele.parisi@tudor-reilly.com or In Switzerland IRF Communications Martin Meier-Pfister or Jan Gregor Tel: +41 43 244 81 54 Mobile: +41 79 652 36 20 synosia@irfcom.ch

Source: Synosia Therapeutics

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