SiteOne Therapeutics, the US-based developer of a non-opioid pain management drug, has raised $15m in a series B round led by pharmaceutical firm Amgen as part of a research and development agreement.
Next Frontier Capital, 2M Companies, Mission Bay Capital, Sears Capital Management, Biobrit, and Z Investments participated alongside Amgen in the round.
SiteOne is developing treatments for acute or chronic pain that will work by inhibiting the Naᵥ1.7 sodium ion channel. Amgen will combine SiteOne’s drug discovery team and portfolio of Naᵥ1.7 inhibitors with its neuroscience team, despite the death in 2016 of George Miljanich, SiteOne’s co-founder and former chief scientific officer.
SiteOne raised $1.5m in its initial round of equity financing, which was led by Sears Capital Management and Biobrit in 2014 with additional cash from Mission Bay Capital and angel investor Joe Zakrzewski.
SiteOne was founded with technology licensed from Stanford University and the company has raised more than $3m in Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant funding from National Institutes of Health (NIH).