US-based genomic medicine developer Ensoma launched on Thursday with $70m in series A financing provided by investors including pharmaceutical firm Takeda and life sciences real estate investment trust Alexandria Real Estate Equities.
5AM Ventures led the round, which also included financial services group Fidelity’s F-Prime Capital unit, Viking Global Investors, Cormorant Asset Management, RIT Capital Partners and Symbiosis II.
Alexandria Real Estate Equities and Takeda invested through Alexandria Venture Investments and Takeda Ventures, respectively, with the latter supplying $10m.
Takeda separately entered into a strategic collaboration agreement that included a $100m upfront payment and is worth up to a total of $1.25bn.
Ensoma is working on single injection treatments for common and rare diseases, without the need for stem cell collection or prior interventions such as chemotherapy. Its approach relies on engineered adenovirus vectors to deliver genome medication tehcnologies into the body.
The company was co-founded by 5AM Ventures together with scientific co-founders Hans-Peter Kiem of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and André Lieber of University of Washington’s School of Medicine.
