VC-Run Dementia Discovery Fund Plays It Safe With First Investment
This article was originally published in Scrip
The Dementia Discovery Fund, launched in October 2015 to much fanfare in the UK, has made its first investment in an established US biotech company – not quite the move UK scientists were hoping for. The DDF is joining a syndicate of venture capital investors in a $29.5m series D financing in Alector LLC which is using antibodies to target neurodegeneration.
Six pharma companies (Biogen, GlaxoSmithKline plc, Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly & Co., Pfizer Inc. and Takeda Pharmaceutical Company), the UK government and the charity Alzheimer's Research UK worked together to raise $100m in total in the first closing of the DDF. This "new" investment model would see pharma pool its expertise, experience, resources and knowledge of the space, but the fund itself would be managed by an experienced venture capital firm.
"The DDF has a global mandate to source the best science wherever it is to create disease modifying drugs for dementia patients globally," Kate Bingham told Scrip. Bingham is a partner at SV Life Sciences (SVLS), the international VC firm running the DDF. "There are plenty of very exciting UK-based projects we are working on as well," she added, although this probably won't reassure the large numbers of UK academics seeking the "very early, hypothesis-testing, target identification" level financing that Bingham referred to in an interview with Scrip at the launch of the DDF.
"The DDF will invest at all stages and we will invest small sums in speculative hypothesis testing early stage projects, but Alector's pipeline of opportunities are more advanced than this," said Bingham.
Alector's approach is based on the hypothesis that neurodegeneration is caused by a failure of the immune system to clear the brain of pathological proteins that accumulate in a host of neurodegenerative diseases. In partnership with Adimab and other antibody discovery platforms, Alector is identifying high affinity antibodies against specific targets that stimulate immune cells to clear aberrant proteins from the brain. This immuno-neurology approach follows the recent clinical successes in immuno-oncology, and is potentially applicable to a range of neurodegenerative disorders including Alzheimer's disease, frontotemporal dementia, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
"Alector's lead project is at lead optimization stage and could enter the clinic in 2018," said Bingham. "It also has a series of early stage projects at different stages from target validation up to lead optimization."
Alector raised its previous financing, a series C round that brought in $30m, around six months ago. The DDF joined Polaris Partners, OrbiMed Advisors, MRL Ventures, GV (formerly Google Ventures), Topspin Partners, Mission Bay and Amgen Ventures in the latest financing.
Alector co-founders include Arnon Rosenthal (CEO) and Tillman Gerngross (chair) who have both been backed by SVLS in previous ventures that led to successful exits (Rinat, Glycofi and Adimab).