Canada-based oncology drug developer Repare Therapeutics raised $68m yesterday in a series A round featuring Celgene Switzerland, an affiliate of pharmaceutical firm Celgene.
Venture capital firms Versant Ventures and MPM Capital co-led the round, which included development capital fund Fonds de solidarité FTQ and the Healthcare Venture Fund formed by BDC Capital, a subsidiary of the Business Development Bank of Canada.
Repare was formed by Versant and announced the funding after 18 months in stealth. It is developing oncology drugs that will fight cancers by targeting their genetically defined weaknesses.
The company’s drug discovery platform is based on an idea called synthetic lethality, in which a combination of the right defects is created in the DNA of a tumour so that it can be destroyed. It has several programs in preclinical development focusing on different targets.
Unlike Versant and MPM, Celgene will not have a representative on Repare’s board of directors. Jim Carmichael, leader of Celgene’s Protein Homeostasis Thematic Center of Excellence, is one of the six members of Repare’s scientific advisory board.