Tiny New York Biotech With Ties To Massachusetts, Syntimmune, Gets A $50 Million Boost

Tiny New York Biotech With Ties to Massachusetts, Syntimmune, Gets a $50 Million Boost June 21, 2017
By Mark Terry, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff

New York – Syntimmune announced today that it had closed a $50 million Series B financing. The round was led by Apple Tree Partners, which committed $48 million. Original investors also participated.

Syntimmune focuses on FcRn biology. FcRn is a well-validated target to treat IgG-mediated autoimmune diseases.

The company’s lead candidate is SYNT001, a monoclonal antibody that blocks FcRn-IgG interactions. It is being evaluated in multiple Phase Ib/IIa trials for IgG-mediated autoimmune diseases. It is being studied in pemphigus and warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia.

The company also is developing SYNT002, which targets the interaction between FcRn and Albumin.

“FcRn-targeted therapies have potential application to a broad range of diseases for which there often are limited treatment options and few or no FDA-approved therapies,” said Sam Hall, of Apple Tree Partners, in a statement. “The rapid clinical advances at Syntimmune have been shepherded by a highly accomplished and experienced team and build upon breakthrough translational science originating from the laboratory of Richard Blumberg, M.D., Syntimmune’s scientific founder. We are excited by this progress and look forward to the continued advancement of SYNT001 through the company’s ongoing Phase Ib/IIa studies and beyond.”

The company expects to use the funding to take SYNT001 toward a potential registration trial. John Carroll, writing for Endpoints News, says, “With this new cash infusion the company can get to the registration study and then have a discussion about the future. As with most venture-backed startups plotting their way through mid-stage work and on to what they hope will be a clean success in a pivotal study, that discussion usually boils down to a choice between an IPO and selling long-term goals to investors, another round or selling the company.”

“We hope to move very rapidly,” David de Graaf, the company’s chief executive officer, told Carroll, “and may even be in a registration trial by the middle to end of next year.”

The SYNT001 program includes a multicenter, open-label, safety, tolerability, and activity Phase Ib/IIa trial in patients with chronic, stable warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia (WAIHA). Primary measures evaluated are safety and tolerability. Secondary measures are pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, immunogenicity, and effects on disease activity markers.

WAIHA is a rare blood disorder where the immune system produces antibodies that attack the individual’s own red blood cells.

The company has also initiated another Phase Ib/IIa trial of SYNT001 in chronic pemphigus (vulgaris or follaceus). Pemphigus is characterized by autoimmune blistering of the skin and mucous membranes. At its worst, the disease can be severely debilitating and potentially lethal.

The company was founded in 2013 by Richard Blumberg and Lawrence Blumberg. Lawrence Blumberg is currently the company’s chief operating officer. Formerly he was an advisor for Syntalogic Pharmaceuticals and Entrepreneur in Residence for The Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School. Richard Blumberg is a faculty member at the Immunology Program at Harvard University. Since its founding, it has brought in a total of $78 million in capital from investors including Apple Tree Partners, Partners Innovation Fund, FMB Research, and AFB Fund.

“Based on these clinical data, together with our preclinical research findings, we are confident that SYNT001 can modulate the critical aspects of FcRn-IgG biology,” said Laurence Blumberg in a statement. “FcRn-IgG blockade with SYNT001 thus has the potential to change the treatment paradigm of many IgG-mediated autoimmune diseases.”

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