Vedanta Biosciences Inks $16.6M Series C-2

Vedanta Biosciences, a clinical-stage company developing a new category of therapies for immune-mediated diseases based on rationally-defined consortia of human microbiome-derived bacteria, today announced a $16.6 million Series C-2 financing round, bringing the total capital raised in its Series C and C-2 round to $62.1 million. Participants include QUAD Investment Management, SV Investment Corp., Shinhan Investment-Private Equity, Shinhan Capital-Yeollim Partners, Partners Investment Co., Ltd, FC Capital, and SymBiosis LLC, who join the previously announced Series C investors, including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Rock Springs Capital, JSR Corporation, Shumway Capital, Invesco Asset Management, Health for Life (Seventure Partners), and founder PureTech Health. The funding further supports the expansion of Vedanta's broad clinical pipeline, including the recently launched Phase 1b/2 study of VE416 in food allergy, a planned Phase 1b/2 study of VE800 and OPDIVO (nivolumab) in advanced or metastatic cancers, and the ongoing Phase 2 study of VE303 in recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection (rCDI).

"We welcome the support from both existing and new investors for Vedanta's expanding activities and maturing portfolio of product candidates based on rationally-defined consortia," said Bernat Olle, Ph.D., co-founder and chief executive officer of Vedanta Biosciences.

Vedanta Biosciences is developing drug candidates based on consortia of natural non-pathogenic bacterial strains designed to effect robust and durable therapeutic changes in a person's gut microbiota. In contrast to fecal transplants or administration of fecal fractions, Vedanta Biosciences' consortia are defined compositions of bacteria manufactured from pure, clonal cell banks, bypassing the need to rely on direct sourcing of fecal donor material of inconsistent composition.

About Vedanta Biosciences

Vedanta Biosciences is a clinical-stage microbiome leader developing a new category of therapies for immune-mediated diseases based on rationally-defined consortia of human microbiome-derived bacteria. Vedanta's proprietary capabilities include what is believed to be the largest collection of human-gut associated bacteria, assays and bioinformatics techniques for consortia design and optimization, vast datasets from human interventional studies and facilities for cGMP-compliant manufacturing of rationally-defined bacterial consortia in powder form.

Vedanta Biosciences' pioneering work, in collaboration with its scientific co-founders, has led to the identification of human commensal bacteria that induce a range of immune responses – including induction of regulatory T cells, CD8+ T cells, and Th17 cells, among others. These advances have been published in leading peer-reviewed journals, including Science (multiple), Nature (2013, 2019), Cell, and Nature Immunology. Vedanta Biosciences has harnessed these biological insights and its capabilities to generate a pipeline of investigational live biotherapeutic products (LBPs) in infectious disease, autoimmune disease, allergy, and immuno-oncology. This pipeline includes three clinical-stage product candidates currently being evaluated for the treatment of recurrent C. difficile infection and inflammatory bowel disease (in collaboration with Janssen Biotech, Inc.), and food allergy, as well as a fourth product candidate expected to enter the clinic in 2019 in patients with advanced or metastatic cancers (in combination with Bristol-Myers Squibb's checkpoint inhibitor OPDIVO).

Vedanta's IP portfolio contains over 30 issued patents with coverage extending to 2037. Vedanta Biosciences was founded by PureTech Health (LSE:PRTC). Its scientific co-founders are world-renowned experts in immunology and microbiology who have pioneered the fields of innate immunity, Th17 and regulatory T cell biology.