From today’s News: “Cambrian Biopharma announces $60M in funding to develop pipeline of companies, therapeutics to treat diseases of aging. Cambrian scientists are targeting the “Nine Hallmarks of Aging,” including cellular senescence, sustained tissue inflammation and mitochondrial dysfunction. They are leveraging breakthroughs in fields that include immunology, genomics, and epigenetics, and technologies that range from gene editing to new stem cell therapies.

“Over the next decade, Cambrian aims to detect and prevent aging-related diseases before they take root,” said James Peyer, CEO and Co-Founder of Cambrian. “Much like scientists were able to prevent and reverse lethal diseases like smallpox and polio in the 20th century, we are inspired to lay the foundation for conquering today’s most devastating diseases at the onset of the 21st century.”

While in stealth mode, the company raised $60 million from a syndicate of long-term investors including Angermayer’s Apeiron Investment Group, Future Ventures, Mike Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital and others. Peyer and Angermayer are joined on Cambrian’s Board of Directors by Maryanna Saenko, Partner at Future Ventures, and Marty Chavez, the former CFO of Goldman Sachs, as a Board Observer.

To date, Cambrian has 14 novel therapies under development within its stable of companies. The first of these to be disclosed is Sensei Bio, which has as its lead therapeutic product candidate a genetically engineered bacteriophage vaccine that has already demonstrated promising data in a Phase 1/2 human clinical trial of patients with late-stage head and neck cancer. “We are proud to announce that with Sensei, there was a $600 million longevity IPO this year,” said Peyer, “you just haven’t heard of it yet.”

www.CambrianBio.com

One response to “Long Live Longevity — Congrats to Cambrian Biopharma on their latest round”

  1. jurvetson Avatar
    jurvetson

    One of our Cambrian sub-co’s is in this weekend’s WSJ: "Every year that you’re alive, your risk of dying increases by 10%. We all know, of course, that we’re more likely to die as we get older and accept this as a fact of nature. If you cast the net a bit wider, however, this fact of nature appears less immutable. Some kinds of salamanders and fish, tiny pond creatures called hydra, and burrow-dwelling rodents called naked mole-rats all have a risk of death unrelated to how long ago they were born.

    So do we humans have to age the way we do? Rapid progress in the biology of aging is leading us to wonder whether humans could take our first tentative steps towards negligible senescence by treating the aging process itself. The aim of biogerontologists working in this fast-developing field is to maximize not lifespan but healthspan: the number of years we spend free from disease, disability and impairment. No one wants to live to 130 if it includes a 50-year stint in a nursing home at the end. Extended healthy life is less attention-getting than eternal life, but pursuing preventive treatments that target the underlying cause of most human suffering could lead there and to a profound revolution in medicine.

    Already, therapies to combat cell senescence—senolytics—are undergoing human trials. There are currently at least 20 startups trying to transfer senolytics from the lab to the clinic. These efforts target specific diseases in which senescent cells are known to be key villains. A team including scientists at the Mayo Clinic who first demonstrated senolytics in mice is working to use the same drug cocktail to treat age-related lung fibrosis.

    Aging causes 85% of deaths in the U.S. but receives just 6% of government health research funding—substantially less than research into diseases like cancer and Alzheimer’s that aging causes. The amount of funding for research into actually treating aging is even smaller, while treating the chronic diseases of aging is a huge component of health costs."

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