Bright Peak Therapeutics, a Switzerland-based cancer and autoimmune disease drug developer, has received $107m in series B funding from investors including life sciences real estate investment trust Alexandria Real Estate Equities.
Investment manager RA Capital Management led the round, which was also backed by financial services and investment group Fidelity, sovereign wealth fund Qatar Investment Authority, Versant Ventures, Invus, and an unspecified healthcare investment fund and funds and accounts managed by BlackRock.
Alexandria Real Estate Equities was represented in the round by its venture capital arm, Alexandria Venture Investments.
Bright Peak is developing immunotherapies utilising engineered cytokines – molecules produced by specific cells in the immune system – to treat cancer and autoimmune diseases.
The company’s technology platform can synthesise therapeutic cytokines by linking short chains of amino acids also known as peptides. It will use the financing to advance its pipeline of cytokine immunotherapies and further develop that platform.
Bright Peak emerged from stealth in July 2020, with $35m of series A funding from Versant Ventures. Its technology is based on research conducted by Bright Peak co-founder Jeffrey Bode, a professor of organic chemistry at ETH Zürich.
Fredrik Wiklund, Bright Peak’s president and CEO, said: “The investment from this accomplished crossover syndicate underscores the enthusiasm for our platform and reaffirms our commitment to transform the therapeutic utility of cytokines to treat people with cancer and autoimmune diseases.”