NEW YORK – Be Biopharma on Wednesday said it has raised $92 million in a Series C funding round to advance its autologous, engineered B-cell therapies.
The Series C round included funding from new investor Nextech Invest and existing investors ARCH Venture Partners, Atlas Venture, RA Capital Management, Alta Partners, Longwood Fund, Bristol Myers Squibb, Takeda Ventures, and others. Nextech Partner Melissa McCracken will join Be Bio's board of directors in connection with the financing.
Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Be Bio will use the proceeds to advance BE-101 for hemophilia B through the clinical proof-of-concept stage.
BE-101 is currently being evaluated in the multicenter, dose-escalation Phase I/II BeCoMe-9 trial, which launched last year. In BE-101, patients' own B cells are modified to include a functional copy of the FIX gene so that they can express sufficient amounts of the clotting protein factor IX that is lacking in hemophilia B.
The funding will also be used to advance BE-102, a treatment that the company is developing for hypophosphatasia, into clinical testing next year. Hypophosphatasia is a rare genetic disorder that affects the development of bones and teeth, and BE-102 involves engineering B cells to produce the ALP enzyme, which is deficient in the condition.
"With this funding in hand, we are well equipped to advance our two lead programs and solidify our position as a multiprogram, clinical-stage company," Be Bio CEO Joanne Smith-Farrell said in a statement.