Financial

Financing for Nuon, Constellation and Neurologix

Nuon Therapeutics Inc. Completes $27 Million Series B Financing
The Series B funding will enable Nuon Therapeutics to advance its orally active lead compound, tranilast, through Phase II clinical trials and support the discovery and development of additional compounds. In 2007, Nuon Therapeutics raised $5 million in its Series A round.

Constellation Pharmaceuticals Closes $32 Million in Series A Funding
Constellation Pharmaceuticals announced that it has closed a $32 million Series A financing. Proceeds from the financing will be used to establish the discovery platform and accelerate the development of a preclinical candidate pipeline of epigenetic-targeted drugs. Third Rock Ventures, The Column Group and Venrock co-led the round.

They say they are the first company:

“…focused on discovering and developing novel drugs targeting selective regulators of epigenetic function…” and are “developing a deep pipeline of preclinical drug candidates based on the unique insights of the founders and scientific advisory board…”

Cute, but really not true. I hate to pull out my malarkey badge and play bullcrap policeman today but I can’t let this one slide… there are plenty or companies targeting “epigenetics” whether they call it that or not. Basically, epigenetics as a therapy, is simply the silencing of hereditary genes; a pretty broad definition. Most often this is accomplished exploiting and removing chemical activation groups on histones (methyl, actetyl type modifications etc…). I’m not close to an expert in this area but a few companies (and probably many others) with HDACs come to mind: MethylGene, Sirtris, Merck and Curagen.

Neurologix Completes Additional $5 Million Private Placement
Neurologix, Inc. (OTCBB:NRGX), completed a private placement of an additional $5 million of Series D Convertible Preferred Stock at a price of $35 per share. Each share of Series D Stock is convertible into approximately 30.17 shares of common stock. The proceeds from the transaction, net of expenses, will be used to finance the further clinical development of the company’s gene transfer technology for Parkinson’s disease and other indications, and for corporate purposes.

“This additional financing is a direct reflection of the progress the company has made to date as well as Corriente’s confidence in our ability to deliver on our development milestones,” said John Mordock, Neurologix President and Chief Executive Officer. “Most recently, we received clearance from the FDA to initiate our Phase 2 clinical trial, and we expect to commence such trial in the second quarter of this year. These funds, along with the $15 million raised in November, provide the company with over $22 million to use towards completing that trial and taking the necessary steps to advance our Parkinson’s indication toward commercialization, including further development of our manufacturing process, regulatory preparation for an anticipated Phase 3 pivotal trial, and building additional supporting infrastructure.”

Theoretically Related Posts

• August 12, 2008 -- Heathcare / Medical Venture Capital Groups (0)
• April 30, 2008 -- Financing for Concert Pharmaceuticals (0)
• July 25, 2008 -- Weekly Biopharm Financing: Cardiome, Genomic Vision, RF Surgical, NuPathe, Cell and Cara Tharapeutics (0)
• July 7, 2008 -- Secretive Agios Makes Splash with $33M Series A (0)
• July 1, 2008 -- CoLucid Rakes in $25M for Migraine Treatment (0)
• June 4, 2008 -- Novartis Buys Protez For Superbug Defense (0)
• June 3, 2008 -- Funding Roundup: IRX, Genesis, Inimex, VeraLight and ONCODESIGN (0)
• May 2, 2008 -- Does the Esperion Spin-Off Signal the Start of New R&D Era? (0)
• March 28, 2008 -- Pieris AG Nets 38M in Series B Financing (0)

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