ProNAi Therapeutics raises $59.5m Series D financing

The round was led by Vivo Capital and included other new investors Frazier Healthcare Ventures, OrbiMed Advisors, Adams Street Partners, RA Capital Management, Caxton Alternative Management, Hopen Life Science Ventures, Sectoral Asset Management, and Janus Capital Management.

Existing investors including Capital Midwest Fund, Apjohn Ventures Fund, Amherst Fund, and Grand Angels also participated in the financing round. For the transaction, Jefferies served as the sole placement agent and Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn served as legal advisor to the company.

ProNAi president and CEO Mina Sooch noted that this financing is a transformative milestone in ProNAi’s ten year history, and follows the clinical results recently reported by the company and its clinical investigators.

"We are pleased to have attracted such an experienced and well regarded group of investors. Their support of this financing will allow us to execute our plans with greater speed and broader reach.

"Since our founding, we have been committed to the development of novel nucleic acid therapeutics designed to treat various genetically defined diseases, initially in certain cancers, with a proprietary technology we have termed DNAi.

"Our lead drug candidate, PNT2258, targets the BCL2 gene. The drug has shown early evidence of systemic anti-tumor effect when administered to patients whose cancers express the BCL2 genetic target.

"With the PNT2258 formulation, ProNAi has overcome the nucleic acid delivery challenges faced by competitive programs by incorporating our unique single stranded, chemically unmodified DNAi® oligonucleotide into a differentiated lipid delivery system (SMARTICLES®).

"The combination of genetic specificity with effective IV delivery provides us the opportunity to construct potential therapies with a broad range of targets in oncology and other diseases," Sooch added.

As part of the Series D financing, Dr Albert Cha (Vivo Capital), Dr Peter Thompson (OrbiMed Advisors), and Dr James Topper (Frazier Healthcare Ventures) have joined ProNAi’s board of directors along with current members Chairman Donald Parfet (Apjohn Ventures) and Alvin Vitangcol (Capital Midwest Fund).

The Series D funding will be used to advance PNT2258 in several Phase II clinical studies in patients with relapsed or treatment refractory non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma including those with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL),Richter’s transformation, and follicular lymphoma (FL).

Proceeds will also be used to support drug manufacturing, advance development of preclinical drug candidates, and build ProNAi’s organization in Michigan.