Reneo Pharmaceuticals, a US-based developer of treatments for mitochondrial diseases, closed a $50m series A round featuring Lundbeckfonden Ventures, the strategic investment arm of pharmaceutical company Lundbeck, yesterday.
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) led the round, which included fellow venture capital firm RiverVest Venture Partners and life sciences investment firm Pappas Capital.
Reneo is working on therapies for genetic mitochondrial diseases, in which genes in cells’ mitochondria mutate and are unable to generate energy from food fats, leading to cramps, pain and muscle wasting.
The series A cash will fund phase 1b clinical trials for Reneo’s lead drug candidate REN001, which is being developed to combat rare mitochondrial diseases like primary mitochondrial myopathies (PMMs) and fatty acid oxidation disorders (FAODs).
Johan Kordel, senior partner at Lundbeckfonden Ventures, has taken a board seat at Reneo along with RiverVest managing director Niall O’Donnell, who is also Reno’s founder and CEO, as well as NEA partner Ed Mathers and Arthur Pappas, managing partner of Pappas Capital.
Reneo CEO Alejandro Dorenbaum said: “People with FAODs or with PMMs have no approved medicines to help manage their disease. We are hopeful that our approach will generate meaningful data and allow us to provide a much-needed treatment option for people suffering from these diseases.”
