Cambridge's Cydan Scores $34M, Names a New CMO

Orphan drug accelerator Cydan Development, Inc. snagged $34 million to fund its rare disease pipeline and also tapped two new members of its executive leadership team.

Cydan’s funding round was backed by several long-time investors, including Pfizer Venture Investments, New Enterprise Associates, Alexandria Venture Investments and Lundbeckfond Ventures. Proceeds will be used to finance another spinout company Cydan, II Inc. Cydan II will be the accelerator’s third company. No information was provided as to what targets the new company would focus its research and development teams on. Cydan only noted that Cydan II would continue the work of Cydan.

“This round of financing shows continued confidence by our syndicate that our approach is effective, and extends our operations for another four years, increasing our ability to positively impact outcomes for patients with rare genetic diseases, Cydan Chief Executive Officer Chris Adams said in a statement.

In addition to Cydan II, Cydan has spun out Vtesse, which is developing a novel therapy for Niemann-Pick Disease Type C (NPC). Vtesse was acquired earlier this year by Sucampo Pharmaceuticals, Inc.When it launched, the company came out of the gates with a deal with the National Institutes of Health to license its version of the drug cyclodextrin to the NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, to be used for the development of a treatment for rare Niemann-Pick Type C disease. NPC is a fatal cholesterol metabolism disorder, in which patients are not able to metabolize cholesterol and other lipids properly within the cell.

Cydan’s second company, Imara was launched in 2016 and is developing IMR-687, a novel treatment for Sickle Cell disease (SCD). Imara recently completed a Phase I trial testing its lead drug candidate IMR-687. The company plans to initiate a Phase II study in adult patients with SCD by the end of 2017. Imara’s IMR-687 is an orally-administered, selective phosphodiesterase 9 (PDE9) inhibitor that was developed to treat the underlying causes of sickle cell disease. Pre-clinical data shows IMR-687 reduces both the sickling of red blood cells and blood vessel occlusion. IMR-687 also demonstrates a robust pre-clinical safety profile, the company said.

In addition to the funding and launching of Cydan II, Cydan expanded its leadership team with the hiring of Chief Medical Officer Shi Yin Foo and new development head Niels Svenstrup. Before joining Cydan Foo served as CMO of Cardioxyl Pharmaceuticals, which was acquired by Bristol-Myers Squibb. Svenstrup served in leadership roles at Ascendia Pharma and H. Lundbeck.