UK-based biopharmaceutical medicine developer Immunocore closed a $130m series B round featuring pharmaceutical firms Eli Lilly and WuXi AppTec yesterday, the latter through its corporate venturing fund.
Growth equity firm General Atlantic led the round, which featured CCB International, JDRF T1D Fund, Rock Springs Capital, Terra Magnum Capital Partners and five existing shareholders that included Eli Lilly and RTW Investments.
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also participated in the round, transforming convertible note financing into equity shares. It had agreed in 2017 to provide up to $40m in financing for the company.
Formed by biotech company MediGene, Immunocore is developing drugs using T cell receptor (TCR) biotechnology that will function by triggering the immune response to cancer in T cells.
The series B funds will be used to advance a product pipeline that includes three molecules being developed to treat cancer, as well as candidates aimed at chronic hepatitis B and Prame, an antigen present in certain tumours.
Immunocore intends to expand its core technology platform to tackle infectious and autoimmune diseases, and will put part of the proceeds into accelerating that process toward autoimmune conditions including type 1 diabetes.
The company had previously secured $320m in funding from Eli Lilly, RTW Investments, Woodford Investment Management, Malin Corporation and unnamed new and existing investors in 2015 at a reported $1bn valuation.
However, a September 2019 report in The Telegraph stated that General Atlantic was investing $60m in the then forthcoming round at a valuation of approximately $625m.
Bahija Jallal, Immunocore’s CEO, said: “This new funding – from an international cadre of healthcare investors joined by some of our existing shareholders – represents a further endorsement of our unique and powerful platform technology, our novel class of TCR-based biologic therapies, the accomplished scientists at Immunocore and our mission to transform the lives of people with serious diseases.”
