ILiAD Biotechnologies, an advanced clinical stage biotechnology company based in Weston, announced it has raised an oversubscribed Series B round of $115 million. The company is focused on the prevention and treatment of diseases such as whooping cough.
Pertussis, or whooping cough, is a life-threatening disease caused by the highly contagious respiratory bacterium Bordetella pertussis. According to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, each year pertussis affects approximately 24 million people globally, accounting for nearly 160,000 deaths in children younger than 5 years. Current vaccines have failed to control whooping cough epidemics, the company says.
“Today’s financing reflects the urgent need for better pertussis vaccines, the scientific rigor and operational discipline of our team, and the extraordinary potential BPZE1 holds to improve global public health,” said Keith Rubin, ILiAD’s founder and CEO, in a statement.
The funding will be used to advance ILiAD’s next generation pertussis vaccine candidate, BPZE1. ILiAD expects to begin a pivotal human challenge trial of BPZE1 in 2026, with initial data expected in 2027. ILiAD Biotechnologies, founded in 2012 to develop key technologies and investigate the impact of B. pertussis in a range of human diseases, is working on validating its proprietary vaccines in human clinical trials.
The financing was led by RA Capital Management with participation from new investors Janus Henderson Investors and BNP Paribas Asset Management Alts, as well as existing investors including a multi-national pharmaceutical company and AI Life Sciences, the company said in its announcement. Mario Barro, Head of Infectious Diseases at RA Capital Management, has joined ILiAD’s Board of Directors.
The $115 million series B round brings ILiAD’s total funding raised to $215 million.
“Across six clinical studies, including a human challenge study published in The Lancet Microbe, BPZE1 has demonstrated the potential to meaningfully advance Bordetella pertussis prevention. Its needle-free administration facilitates broad access, and by inducing robust mucosal immunity, BPZE1 may provide a more natural and durable immune response capable of preventing both disease and transmission,” said Barro of RA Capital Management.
The new tranche comes as the US government has been more skeptical of financing early-stage vaccine work, especially if it involves mRNA technology. Barro told Endpoints he hasn’t seen a chilling effect on the startup ecosystem. “We are pretty busy, I can tell you, on getting inbound requests, and people doing different types of development,” he said.
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