Effector Therapeutics raises series B financing to $56m

Sectoral Asset Management and existing investors participated in the new funding round. In total, Effector has raised around $111m since its establishment in 2013.

Effector’s lead compound is an oral MNK1 and MNK2 inhibitor, called eFT508, which is being studied in a Phase 1/2 trial with patients that have advanced solid tumors.

The company expects to file a second IND for the drug in the first half of this year to study its efficacy in lymphoma as well. Effector intends to announce a second drug candidate later this year.

Effector said it will use the funds to advance its discovery pipeline addressing additional targets.

Effector Therapeutics president and CEO Steve Worland said: "Cancer has proven to be a very difficult disease.

"If we are going to bring more effective therapy to patients, we need to think strategically about new approaches to treatment. Translation regulation targets such as MNK1 and MNK2, which simultaneously regulate multiple cancer-driving and immune-signaling pathways, are an ideal way to pursue this need."

The company said MNK1 and MNK2 integrate signals from various oncogenic and immune signaling pathways by phosphorylating eukaryotic initiation factor 4E (eIF4E) and other important mRNA binding proteins, which regulates the stability and translation of select mRNAs crucial for tumor growth and survival.