Genetic disease company 4s3 Bioscience has raised $20m from a subsidiary of KLP Enterprises, a trust formed by the investment office of the wealthy Pritzker and Vlock families.
KLP subsidiary Alopexx Entreprises, a healthcare company founded in 2011, will partner with US-based 4s3 to grow the company as well as providing the Series A financing on Monday.
Daniel Vlock, chief executive of Alopexx, said: "We are excited to be working with 4s3. We are very impressed with the broad applicability of 4s3’s antibody technology and the company’s robust intellectual property portfolio. The in vivo preclinical data validates the potential for this approach."
The company received seed funding from Genzyme Ventures, the corporate venturing fund of Genzyme Corporation, in 2008. Its intellectual property includes a licensed portfolio from UCLA. It has also been backed by the Massachusetts Life Science Center (MLSC), which provided a $600,000 loan, the Muscular Dystrophy Association, which invested $260,000, the National Institute of Health, and the HHS Therapeutic Discovery Project.
4s3 was founded in 2007 by vice president of research, Dustin Armstrong, and president and chief executive, Timothy Harris.