Belgium-based drugs company UCB has invested $20m in Swiss peer Synosia Therapeutics’ series C round in return for exclusive, worldwide rights to the development of two compounds for Parkinson’s disease.
As part of the license, Synosia will also receive an undisclosed upfront payment and could receive potential regulatory and commercial milestone payments of up to $725m across both compounds.
Ismail Kola, executive vice president of drug discovery and president of UCB New Medicines, said: "With access to these two potentially important new treatments for people living with movement disorders, UCB reinforces its intention to become the patient-centric biopharmaceutical leader in neurology and immunology."
Synosia will be responsible for SYN-115 and SYN-118 through Phase II clinical development and UCB will be responsible for Phase III clinical development and its sales.
The remaining $10m in Synosia’s C round came from venture capital firms Versant Ventures, 5AM Ventures, Aravis Venture, Investor Growth Capital and Swiss Helvetia Fund and Denmark-based medical foundation Novo.
In January last year, Synosia (formerly known as Synosis Therapeutics) raised SFr32m ($29m) in its series B round as its portfolio of six clinical-stage compounds acquired from Roche, Novartis and Syngenta were showing promising signs of development.
As Synosis, the company had raised $32.5m in its first round from its venture consortium and signed a partnership with Roche after its launch in 2006 out of the incubation unit of Versant Ventures, according to news provider VentureWire.