BERKELEY, Calif., Jan. 13, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Kyverna
Therapeutics ("Kyverna"), a cell therapy company engineering a new
class of therapies for serious autoimmune diseases, announced today
that it has raised $25 million in a
Series A investment from Vida Ventures and Westlake Village
BioPartners, both of which were founding investors, as well as
Gilead Sciences (NASDAQ: GILD). Proceeds from the financing will be
used to advance Kyverna's therapeutic strategy which combines
advanced T cell engineering and synthetic biology technologies to
suppress and eliminate autoreactive immune cells at the root cause
of inflammatory disease. Dominic
Borie, M.D., Ph.D., has been appointed as Chief Executive
Officer (CEO). Jeffrey Greve, Ph.D.,
will continue to serve as Kyverna's Chief Scientific Officer (CSO).
Prior to Kyverna, Dr. Greve founded and served as CSO of Delinia,
an autoimmune disease company acquired by Celgene in 2017.
As part of this financing, Fred
Cohen, M.D., D.Phil., Co-Founder and Senior Managing
Director of Vida Ventures will serve as Chairman of the Board.
Beth Seidenberg, M.D., Co-Founding
Managing Director of Westlake Village BioPartners, Desmond Padhi, B.Sc., Pharm. D., Principal at
Westlake Village BioPartners, Brian Kotzin, M.D., Senior Vice
President of Nektar Therapeutics, Peter
Emtage, Ph.D., Senior Vice President, Global Head of
Research, Kite, a Gilead Company, one additional representative
from Vida Ventures to be named, and Dominic
Borie, M.D., Ph.D., will serve on the Company's the Board of
Directors.
"We are just beginning to see the potential for cell therapy and
the opportunity to change the course of disease. Dominic's skill as
an immunologist and transplant surgeon, coupled with his proven
leadership skill as an executive in the biopharmaceutical industry
is what we require to embark on our bold vision for Kyverna," said
Fred Cohen, M.D., D.Phil.,
Co-Founder and Senior Managing Director of Vida Ventures. "At Vida,
we have a long-standing commitment to advancing cell therapy. We
believe the team at Kyverna, under Dominic's stewardship and in
partnership with Dr. Greve, the architect of the Kyverna scientific
platform, has the ability to develop a new class of therapies for
serious autoimmune diseases."
"This may be one of the most exciting times is our industry
where a new modality has the potential to become the backbone of
treatment for a variety of severe immune-related diseases," said
Dominic Borie, M.D., Ph.D., newly
appointed CEO of Kyverna. "This opportunity perfectly unites my
experience as a surgeon, academic and drug developer with my
passion for finding cures for autoimmune diseases. I am proud to
serve as Kyverna's CEO and be a part of this team."
Kyverna also announced that it has entered into a strategic
collaboration and license agreement with Gilead to develop
engineered T cell therapies for the treatment of autoimmune disease
based on Kyverna's synthetic Treg platform and synNotch™
technology from Kite, a Gilead Company. Kyverna will be responsible
for conducting research activities and initial clinical studies
through proof-of-concept and Gilead will be granted an option, upon
the exercise of which Gilead will be solely responsible for further
clinical development and commercialization efforts for these
programs. Gilead will make to Kyverna an upfront payment of
$17.5 million and Kyverna may earn an
additional $570 million in
development and commercialization milestones. Kyverna will also
continue to advance its platform and develop proprietary programs
beyond the Gilead collaboration.
"Kyverna's approach combines advanced T cell engineering and
synthetic biology technologies to develop significant new therapies
for autoimmune and inflammatory diseases," said Beth Seidenberg, M.D., Co-Founding Managing
Director of Los Angeles-based
Westlake Village BioPartners. "The strategic collaboration with
Gilead Sciences in autoimmune diseases enables Kyverna to apply its
therapeutic approach to this important unmet need."
Dr. Borie is an accomplished immunologist and digestive tract
and liver transplant surgeon with extensive experience in drug
development. He joins Kyverna from Horizon Therapeutics where he
served as Vice-President and Head, External Research and
Development. Prior to Horizon, Dr. Borie served in numerous
leadership functions within Genentech focused on global clinical
development of immunology therapies including two anti-CD20
molecules (rituximab and obinutuzumab) in development for orphan
immunology indications. Dr. Borie had joined Genentech from Amgen
where he served as Medical Director and Global Development Leader
for Inflammation. He started his career in industry at Roche as
Director of Transplantation research before transitioning to
Translational Medicine roles for inflammation. Prior to the
transition to industry, Dr. Borie was in academia at Stanford University as the Director,
Transplantation Immunology Laboratory where he became a key
contributor in the validation of JAK inhibition as a new
immunomodulatory approach to treating rheumatoid arthritis. Dr.
Borie was previously a digestive surgery and liver transplantation
attending surgeon at Pitie- Salpetriere Hospital, Assistance
Publique in Paris, France. He
received his Ph.D. in transplantation immunology from the
University of Paris V - Descartes and his M.D., Master's degree in
Immunology and Certificate of Immunology and Immunopathology from
the University of Paris XII.
About Vida Ventures
Vida Ventures is a next-generation
life sciences investment firm founded by a group of scientists,
physicians, entrepreneurs and investors passionate about building
and funding breakthroughs in biomedicine. Together they form an
independent, bold investment group bound together by a simple word
– life. Its mission is to bring science to life and advance
transformative biomedical innovations that have the potential to
make a meaningful difference for patients. Vida has a bicoastal
presence and currently has approximately $1
billion under management. For more information on Vida
Ventures, please visit www.vidaventures.com, on LinkedIn or follow
on Twitter @Vida_Ventures.
About Westlake Village BioPartners
Westlake Village
BioPartners is a Los Angeles
area-based venture capital firm focused on incubating and building
life sciences companies with entrepreneurs that have the potential
to bring transformative therapies and technologies to patients. The
Westlake model is built on the founding team's unique experience in
successfully identifying and developing breakthrough therapies and
building organizations. For more information, please
visit http://westlakebio.com/.
About Kyverna Therapeutics
Kyverna Therapeutics,
located in the San Francisco East Bay, is a cell therapy company
engineering a new class of therapies for serious autoimmune
diseases. The Kyverna therapeutic platform combines advanced T cell
engineering and synthetic biology technologies to suppress and
eliminate the autoreactive immune cells at the root cause of
inflammatory diseases. For more information, please visit
http://kyvernatx.com/.
synNotch is a registered trademark of Kite Pharma,
Inc.
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SOURCE Kyverna Therapeutics