Japan-based pharmaceutical company Takeda Pharmaceutical and US-based investment firm Frazier Healthcare Partners co-launched a biopharmaceutical company called Outpost Medicine on Monday with $41m of funding.
Frazier led the series A round, which included contributions from pharmaceutical company Novo, private equity firm Adams Street Partners and investment firm Vivo Capital.
Outpost Medicine has secured an exclusive license from Takeda to develop and commercialise a clinical stage drug candidate for stress urinary incontinence, a condition that results in unintentional loss of urine during physical activity. The financial terms of that deal have not been revealed.
Peter Bisgaard, senior partner at Novo’s investment subsidiary Novo Ventures; Chen Yu, managing partner at Vivo Capital; Terry Gould, partner and head of direct investments at Adams Street; and Dan Estes, principal at Frazier, are all directors on Outpost’s board.
Tachi Yamada, chairman and co-founder of Outpost and venture partner at Frazier, said: “Stress urinary incontinence is an often debilitating condition with a major impact on quality of life for those who suffer from it. It is also very common with more than 18 million adults afflicted in the US alone.
“Despite the enormity of the unmet medical need, there are no pharmacologic agents approved in the US to treat stress urinary incontinence, and drugs for other forms of incontinence like overactive bladder are ineffective for this condition.”