IvyCap Ventures and current investor 1Crowd joined forces with Capital 2B, Shastra VC, and Kotak Lifesciences Fund I, a fund managed by Kotak Alternate Asset Managers, to co-lead a $12 million (approximately Rs 100 crore) Series A financing round for Avammune Therapeutics and its subsidiary, Avammune Lifesciences.
The money will be used to support the clinical development of lead candidate AVA-NP-695 (an ENPP1 inhibitor), develop orally bioavailable small molecules, and speed up its proprietary pipeline that targets the innate immune system, according to a press release from Avammune Therapeutics.
Avammune Therapeutics, a biopharmaceutical company co-founded in 2020 by Aditya Kulkarni, Srinivasan Namala, and Arun B. Papaiah, is focused on finding small molecule medications that target the innate immune system to treat autoimmune diseases and cancer. Its pipeline targets autoimmune diseases, triple-negative breast cancer, GI cancers, osteosarcoma, and Ewing’s sarcoma.
Avammune claims that its main asset is an ENPP1 inhibitor, which has shown potent anti-tumor efficacy in a number of preclinical cancer models as well as in “compassionate use” settings involving veterinary cancer patients. AVA-ADR is one of the few ADAR1 inhibitors available that has shown in vivo efficacy and has the potential to be a first-in-class ADAR1 p150 inhibitor.
The global immuno-oncology market is estimated to be worth $100 billion and is expanding quickly at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 17%.
