Lucia Bio has announced that it has raised an additional $2 million in seed financing, bringing the total seed investment secured to date to $3 million.
The company said the additional seed financing consists of a further $1 million investment from the UniQuest Extension Fund and $1 million from Uniseed-managed funds.
Proceeds from the raise will be used to support the continued development of Lucia Bio’s portfolio of potent and highly selective Spleen Tyrosine Kinase (Syk) inhibitors, including broadening the therapeutic potential to the treatment of peripheral autoimmune conditions in addition to neuroinflammation indications.
The company said that key activities supported by the seed financing include initiating the toxicology program on the company’s lead asset QED-701 which is being developed to treat neuroinflammation associated with neurodegenerative conditions, as well as progressing a second molecule, QED-121, into chemistry, manufacturing and controls activities leading to initiation of clinical trial enabling studies to support development for the treatment of autoimmune conditions.
“The support of the UniQuest Extension Fund and Uniseed allows us to broaden and accelerate the development of our best-in-class Syk inhibitors and maintain momentum in the program as we look to raise a Series A," said Tom McCarthy, co-founder and executive chair of Lucia Bio.
"Use of proceeds from this first syndicated round would include completion of the remaining clinical trial enabling studies and the Phase 1 clinical program for both molecules of QED-701 and QED-121 that will lay a foundation for subsequent Phase 2 clinical proof of concept studies, with potential indications selected from certain neuroinflammatory and autoimmune conditions.
"Syk is a clinically validated target in human immunology, although capitalising on the full clinical potential for Syk inhibition has been hampered by molecules without the required intersection of potency, selectivity and drug-like properties. With UniQuest’s significant prior investment in the discovery of best-in-class Syk inhibitors, Lucia Bio is well poised to deliver molecules that fully exploit the potential of inhibiting this critical node in human immunology.”
The Syk program was initially developed at UniQuest’s commercial drug discovery group, QEDDI, which was established with an industry-experienced team to advance The University of Queensland’s (UQ) promising drug targets towards the clinic.
Dr Dean Moss, CEO of UQ’s commercialisation company UniQuest, said, “We are excited by the significant clinical potential for best-in-class Syk inhibitors that capitalise on foundational Australian science conducted by QEDDI. UniQuest has had the privilege to leverage world class science conducted by QEDDI, successful spin-out formation via the UniQuest IP commercialisation team, and finally investment by the UEF. This seed financing lays the foundation for its translation into potential innovative medicines across a wide range of conditions. We look forward to continuing to work with Tom, Kirsty and the MTM team as Lucia Bio charts a similar global clinical development trajectory, in this case based on key Australian scientific discoveries.”
Lucia Bio said preclinical data for QED-701 show that the compound possesses excellent drug-like properties and impressive activity across peripheral and central neuroinflammatory preclinical models. Critically, QED-701 is highly selective over kinases shown to be responsible for causing hypertension and haematological adverse events that have been observed for prior Syk inhibitors in the clinic.