UK-based vaccine developer SpyBiotech received $32.5m yesterday in a series A round featuring internet technology conglomerate Alphabet’s GV unit.
Braavos Investment Advisers led the round, participating alongside Oxford Sciences Innovation (OSI), Oxford Investment Consultants and the UK government-owned Future Fund, which converted an existing loan.
Spun out of University of Oxford in 2017, SpyBiotech is working on technology that will facilitate the safe delivery of vaccines while increasing efficacy, and is focusing on infectious and chronic diseases as well as cancer.
The series A proceess will allow the company to progress its lead asset, a potential vaccine for human cytomegalovirus – a virus found in the majority of humans that is usually harmless but which can cause severe or fatal disease in immunocompromised patients or newborns – towards a phase 1 trial in early 2022.
The funding will also support further technology development. Lutz Giebel has been appointed chairman of SpyBiotech in conjunction with the round, which brought its total funding to $39m, it said. The latest financing followed a $5m seed round led by OSI and backed by GV in 2017.
