Allorion Debuts with $40 Million to Enhance and Discover Precision Targets
Allorion Therapeutics is thankful for the $40 million in Series A financing it announced Wednesday morning, a day ahead of Thanksgiving.
With headquarters in both Natick, Massachusetts and Guangzhou, China, Allorion’s drug discovery engine combines advances in protein structure, big data, machine learning and gene editing to discover and develop highly selective small molecules.
The precision medicine company is developing mutant selective and isoform-specific drugs in non-conventional ways for well-known targets in the oncology and autoimmune spaces, with the aim to improve upon efficacy and prevent resistance. Along with existing targets, Allorion’s proprietary technology systemically screens for synthetic lethality targets and allosteric inhibitors.
The company believes that “carefully cultivating the synergy of these two approaches” will allow it to build a robust pipeline with the intention of transforming the paradigm for cancer and autoimmune disease.
Founder and CEO Peter Ding expressed optimism about where Allorion currently stands and where he sees it heading.
“Over the past year, Allorion has built up R&D capabilities in Boston and Guangzhou and formed a strong management and R&D team. Multiple projects achieved their milestones,” Ding said in a statement. “We are grateful to all the investors for their trust and support. Allorion will leverage cutting-edge technologies and strive to make precision medicine more precise and accessible to more patients.”
The funding was led by Chinese VC Qiming Venture Partners and helped by participation from IDG Capital, Octagon Capital, Firstred Capital and Elikon Venture. Original investors TF Capital and Med-Fine Capital continue to like what they see and returned for this round.
“There are huge unmet medical needs for autoimmune disease and cancer therapy globally. Based on data mining and an in-depth understanding of disease biology, Allorion focuses on the early discovery and development of precision medicines. We have confidence in the team's strong R&D capabilities. We hope to support Allorion to grow into a globally-recognized company and improve patients' life quality,” said Qiming principal Chen Kan.
Allorion will apply the new funds to advance its preclinical projects, Investigational New Drug (IND)-enabling studies and to support the IND applications for two drug candidates. The company will also ramp up its investment in its novel screening technologies, and further build out both its clinical and business development teams.
“The completion of this financing round shows investors' recognition of the progress and the support for the company's long-term strategy on highly innovative platforms for best- or first-in-class drug discovery,” Ding added.
The oncology space can be thankful this year for a number of other innovative new players. Elucida Oncology launched in January to develop drug conjugates with its C-Dots, which precisely target and penetrate tumors, and ArriVent Biopharma debuted in June with $150 million in Series A financing and an epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase inhibitor (EGFR TKI) candidate for lung cancer.