US-based cancer drug developer Acrivon Therapeutics secured $100m yesterday in a series B round backed by life science real estate investment trust Alexandria Real Estate Equities.
Investment manager Wellington Management co-led the round with Surveyor Capital, a subsidiary of wealth management firm Citadel, while Alexandria took part through its venture capital vehicle, Alexandria Venture Investments.
The round also featured RA Capital Management, Perceptive Advisors, Sands Capital, HBM Healthcare Investments, Marshall Wace, HealthCor Management, BB Pureos Bioventures, Acorn Bioventures and an entity called Chione.
Acrivon has created precision proteomics technology which facilitates the development of diagnostics capable of connecting drug mechanisms to the processes that drive cancer, potentially revealing sensitivities to specific treatments that would not otherwise have been found.
The cash will be used to progress a drug pipeline which includes the company’s lead product candidate, ACR-368, which has been licensed from pharmaceutical firm Eli Lilly and which has undergone phase 2 clinical trials for multiple forms of cancer.
The round comes nine months after Acrivon raised $15.5m in funding from two investors – likely to have been Alexandria Venture Investments and Chione according to a company statement this week.
Peter Blume-Jensen, Acrivon’s founder and CEO, said: “On the heels of the company’s recent public launch in late June, we are pleased to have attracted a top-tier syndicate of leading private/public investors that recognise the transformative potential of our platform and pipeline.”
