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June 30, 2020 Bioscience

Biotech raises $25M, aims to boost immune system to fight cancer

PHOTO | Contributed Aaron Ring
By Michelle Tuccitto Sullo

A New Haven-based biotech has raised $25 million in Series A financing and expects to bring its lead anti-tumor candidate into clinical trials next year.

Simcha Therapeutics, incorporated in 2018, is working to develop drugs which enhance the body’s ability to fight off diseases, including cancer. 

Aaron Ring, MD, the company’s scientific founder and an assistant professor of immunobiology at the Yale School of Medicine, led the company in the development of a cytokine with antitumor effects, a variant of interleukin-18 (IL-18).

According to Ring, cytokines “tap into pathways that are hard-wired into immune cells.”

“The challenge is that nature didn’t design them to be anti-cancer therapies; they’re signaling molecules, so their activity can be hard to specifically direct,” Ring said in an announcement.

The company is engineering custom-built proteins that can activate and expand immune system responders, such as T cells and natural killer cells, according to Ring.

“Too many cancer patients do not respond to the immunotherapies available today,” Ring said. “We’re hopeful that our approach will provide new options and potential benefits to these patients.”

According to the company, cytokine therapies developed decades ago had dramatic response in some cancer patients, but also had “substantial toxicities and limited efficacy.” 

Simcha is engineering a new generation of cytokines aimed at successfully eradicating cancer through controlled immune cell activation.

It anticipates launching a Phase 1 trial for its lead program, ST-067, a designer IL-18 cytokine, in the first half of 2021. According to the company, it has shown “potent” antitumor effects when tested on animals.

“We are hopeful it could be effective in tumors that have not otherwise responded to immune-based treatments, as well as enhance the activity of standard cancer immunotherapies,” Ring said.

Simcha indicated it plans to hire a full executive team in the coming months. The company’s investors include WuXi AppTec’s Corporate Venture Fund, Sequoia Capital China and Connecticut Innovations.

Contact Michelle Tuccitto Sullo at msullo@newhavenbiz.com.

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