Proteostasis Therapeutics, Inc. Raises $37 Million In Crossover Financing

CAMBRIDGE, MA--(Marketwired - September 08, 2015) - Proteostasis Therapeutics, Inc. (PTI), a company developing novel therapeutics to treat diseases caused by defects in protein processing, today announced that it has secured $37 million in a Series B mezzanine equity financing. The company plans to use the proceeds of this financing to advance its lead product candidate in cystic fibrosis into human clinical studies and continue to expand its product portfolio.

The financing was led by Cormorant Asset Management and also included Rock Springs Capital Management. Existing investors New Enterprise Associates, Elan Science One, HealthCare Ventures, Fidelity Biosciences, Novartis Bioventures, Novartis Venture Fund, and Sanofi-Genzyme BioVentures also participated in the financing. Leerink Partners LLC acted as the exclusive placement agent to the company for the offering.

"Cormorant Global Healthcare Fund is pleased to participate in the mezzanine equity financing of PTI. We believe PTI's pipeline of drug candidates has the potential to provide significant benefits to a broad group of cystic fibrosis patients. We are excited to support this experienced management team as they advance a series of compounds through clinical trials. We are happy to join such an innovation-focused investor group and to help PTI achieve its mission to improve the lives of patients with cystic fibrosis," stated Bihua Chen, Managing Member and Chief Executive Officer of Cormorant Asset Management.

"We are very pleased that we were able to attract such a strong investor group to our company at this important time in our development and we welcome the new investors to our existing group of top-tier investors," said Meenu Chhabra, PTI's President and Chief Executive Officer. "As we advance our programs into clinical development, PTI is in a strong position to improve upon present treatments for patients with cystic fibrosis. We are confident that we will continue to build on our promising preclinical results to advance our lead product in to the clinic."

About CFTR Amplifiers

Proteostasis Therapeutics, Inc.'s lead asset represents a new class of agents, called cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) amplifiers, for the treatment of cystic fibrosis (CF). CFTR amplifiers represent a new drug class able to enhance the effect of known CFTR modulators, such as potentiators and correctors. In preclinical studies this amplifier was effective across CFTR mutation classes and forms the basis for PTI's strategy to seek to develop a broad-acting combination therapy able to serve CF patients with most mutations. The lead asset is fully-owned by PTI and was internally discovered through the company's proprietary Disease-Relevant Translation (DRT™) platform. CF is a genetic disorder affecting approximately 70,000-100,000 people worldwide. Improvement in disease management protocols and approval of new drugs to treat the symptoms have extended the life expectancy for CF patients, which is now approaching 40 years of age. However, CF remains an incurable disease that leads to death.

About Proteostasis Therapeutics

Proteostasis Therapeutics, Inc. is developing disease-modifying therapeutics for diseases of protein processing. By combining the DRT™ platform, a phenotypic screening approach based on the use of functionally pertinent cellular assays, with state of the art medicinal chemistry tools, PTI generates highly selective drug candidates that modulate the proteostasis imbalance in the cell. In addition to its multiple wholly-owned programs in CF, PTI has formed collaborations with Biogen Inc. to research and identify therapeutic candidates for neurodegenerative disease and with Astellas Pharma Inc. to research and identify therapies targeting the Unfolded Protein Response (UPR) pathway.