October 8, 2015
By Mark Terry, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
Opsonix, Inc., founded by Baxter Ventures, launched today with a Series A round worth $8 million. The company’s technology focuses on removing infectious pathogens and toxins from circulating blood.
The Series A round was led by Baxter Ventures with private investor Hansjörg Wyss. Baxter Ventures, created in 2011 by Baxter International , invests in innovative life science technologies, products, therapies and companies.
Opsonix’s lead product is a recombinant human protein derived from mannose binding lectin (MBL), which is fused to the Fc region of human immunoglobulin (FcMBL). The FcMBL is attached to the membrane of a dialysis device, which has the ability to remove bacteria, fungi, parasites, viruses and toxins from the bloodstream. It is designed to work together with traditional antibiotics.
“Opsonix’s pathogen-extracting therapy provides a novel therapeutics solution leveraging the broad binding activities of a natural human protein that may rapidly remove sepsis-causing pathogens—and the toxins they release—from a patient’s blood,” said Eric Devroe, founder and chief executive of Opsonix in a statement. “With our FcMBL-based pathogen-extracting therapy, treatment of blood-borne infectious disease can be initiated earlier in the course of infection, when it is most needed, without having to wait to identify the disease-causing pathogen.”
The launch followed a worldwide exclusive licensing agreement between Opsonix and Harvard’s Office of Technology Development (OTD). The original work was led by Don Ingber, founding director of the Wyss Institute, and Michael Super, a Wyss senior staff scientist. The original research was funded by more than $22 million by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) under its Dialysis-Like Therapeutic program.
“We are developing an entirely new approach to treat sepsis that directly and quickly eliminates the pathogens and toxins that trigger the sepsis cascade,” said Ingber to KCENTV. “Even more importantly, we can accomplish this without having to first identify the infectious agent.”
The company plans to use the Series A funds to advance the technology toward clinical investigations.
Before taking over as chief executive officer of Opsonix, Eric Devroe worked with Ingber and Super as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the Wyss Institute. He was formerly executive director of the MD Anderson Institute for Applied Cancer Science, and was previously vice president of business and strategy development for Metamark Genetics, and an associate with Flagship Ventures.
Daniel Geffken will be chief financial officer. Ingber and Super will act as scientific founders.
The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering is located at Harvard University. Its goal is to use nature’s design principles to develop bioinspired materials and devices for medical applications, energy, architecture, robotics and manufacturing.
