NEW YORK – Senti Biosciences on Monday said it expects to raise $37.6 million in gross proceeds via an oversubscribed private placement equity financing, which it will use to develop its off-the-shelf chimeric antigen receptor natural killer (CAR-NK) cell therapy SENTI-202 in CD33- or FLT3-expressing hematologic malignancies.
The South San Francisco, California-based firm said it has entered into a securities purchase agreement with certain existing and new investors to sell 16,713 shares of Series A convertible preferred stock through a private investment in public equity (PIPE) financing. Celadon Partners led the PIPE financing, slated to close by Thursday, and New Enterprise Associates, Leaps by Bayer, Nantahala Capital, Red Hook Fund, and other institutional and accredited investors also participated.
In addition to the $37.6 million in gross proceeds the firm expects to bring in via the PIPE financing, Senti said it will also give investors the option to exercise warrants to buy up to 25,069,500 additional shares of its common stock. Senti has also granted one investor the option to buy another 4,444 shares of its preferred stock and accompanying warrants, which is slated to close by Dec. 27 and is expected to bring in another $10 million in gross proceeds.
Leerink Partners is the placement agent for the PIPE financing, proceeds from which Senti will use for R&D activities, for general corporate purposes, to ramp up manufacturing capabilities, and specifically, to advance SENTI-202.
On Monday, Senti separately reported data from an ongoing Phase I clinical trial of SENTI-202 in patients with relapsed or refractory CD33- and/or FLT3-expressing blood cancers, including acute myeloid leukemia. Two out of three patients who received the lowest dose of CAR-positive NK cells experienced a complete response and were measurable residual disease-negative after treatment. One patient has responded so far for four months and the other for three months.
According to the firm, SENTI-202 has been generally well tolerated by patients so far, and they've experienced side effects consistent with what would be expected from lymphodepleting chemotherapy. Senti believes that its cell therapy has the potential to overcome the limitations of existing AML therapies and plans to report out additional data in 2025 as it continues its dose-finding trial.