US-based oncology-focused biopharmaceutical company Mirna Therapeutics secured $41.8m yesterday for a series D round led by healthcare company Baxter’s corporate venturing arm, Baxter Ventures.
The round also included pharmaceutical firms Celgene and Pfizer, which invested through its Pfizer Ventures subsidiary, as well as Eastern Capital, Santé Ventures, Morningside Ventures, Rock Springs Capital, Sofinnova Ventures, New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Osage University Partners and Correlation Ventures.
Mirna will use the funding to advance its lead drug candidate, a cancer compound, into Phase 1b and Phase 2 clinical trials in 2016. A second drug candidate will also be advanced into clinical trials.
Pfizer previously took part in Mirna’s $34.5m series C round in 2012, which was led by Sofinnova and also backed by Correlation Ventures, Osage University Partners and NEA.
Mirna had already raised $1.5m from undisclosed investors in 2011, and received a $10.3m commercialisation grant from Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas in 2010, and a $5m grant award from Texas Emerging Technology Fund the year before.