Leadership team expanded with addition of Chief Corporate Development Officer, Ted Hibben, a 25-year venture-stage business development biotherapeutic industry veteran Total venture funding tops $50M to date
GERMANTOWN, MD / ACCESSWIRE / September 21, 2023 / Seraxis Inc., a cell therapy company developing a pancreatic organoid cure to transform the lives of patients with Type 1 and insulin-requiring Type 2 diabetes, today announced the closing of the second tranche of its inaugural VC round to bring total equity investment in the company to over $50 million. Frazier Life Sciences, Polaris Partners, Eli Lilly and the JDRF T1D Fund participated in the step-up triggered by Seraxis' achieving the completion of preclinical milestones of Seraxis' novel pancreatic organoids, SR-02.
"Seraxis manufactures off-the-shelf pancreatic organoids from a stem cell line that was itself derived from a human pancreatic islet," said Seraxis CEO, Dr. William Rust. "The result is a highly pure population of organoids that closely resembles the structure and function of native islets. We are very proud to have accomplished this manufacturing at clinical scale, with efficient, clinically compliant manufacturing processes, and used those organoids to complete IND-enabling pre-clinical studies."
"Seraxis game-changing stem cell line is not only highly functional pre-clinically but reproducibly manufacturable in a format suitable for clinical and, ultimately, commercial scale," said Dr. Jamie Topper, a Director of Seraxis and Partner at Frazier Life Sciences. "Early animal data is very promising for a successful human implantation of these replacement organoids and could transform the lives of patients beset by the daily management and life-threatening complications of insulin-requiring diabetes."
As the lead islet organoid program, SR-02, nears IND filing, the company has recruited 25-year business development veteran Ted Hibben to lead external business and commercial initiatives in the diabetes therapy ecosystem as Chief Corporate Development Officer. Ted has been the business leader in the C-suite of multiple therapeutic biotechnology companies, affecting over two dozen partnering transactions, IPOs and trade sales.
"Seraxis' technology enables a differentiated disease-modifying therapy that promises to be safer, more efficacious and more scalable than other curative diabetes approaches, and to address a massive unmet medical need - over 1.5 million people in the US alone attempting to manage Type-1-Diabetes," said Mr. Hibben. "I look forward to mustering financial and partnership resources to promptly advance Seraxis' diabetes programs and to initiate collaborations to derive stem cells from other organs for future replacement organoid therapies."
ABOUT SERAXIS
Seraxis is bringing transformative cures to the millions of people worldwide struggling with the management and life-threatening complications of insulin-dependent diabetes.
Seraxis' lead program, SR-02, is a novel, off-the-shelf pancreatic organoid therapy slated to enter clinical testing with immunosuppressive therapy in 2024 in patients with severe recurrent hypoglycemia. A follow-on diabetes program, SR-03, is a version of the Seraxis organoid altered to be unrecognized by the immune system for the broader indication of insulin-dependent patients without chronic immune suppression.
Seraxis' underlying proprietary technology enables the creation of a pipeline of novel stem cell-derived therapies originating from single donated organs for other indications. The company's lead therapeutic program, SR-02, is manufactured from a stem cell line derived from a human donor pancreas. These cells preferentially re-differentiate into organoids containing all the endocrine cells of the native pancreatic islet, and with safety, potency, and manufacturing advantages over embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells.
Seraxis manufactures its best-in-class therapeutic organoids using scalable, clinically compliant processes in its cGMP facility located in Maryland's I-270 Biotech Corridor.
For more information, please visit www.seraxis.com.
Contact Information:
Ted Hibben
Chief Corporate Development Officer
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
SOURCE: Seraxis Inc.