BerGenBio Secures Approx. $25M in Funding

bergenbioBerGenBio AS, a Bergen, Norway-based clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, secured NOK212m (approx. $25m) in funding.

Backers included existing shareholders Investinor AS and Meteva AS.

The company intends to use the funds to progress the development of its pipeline of innovative cancer therapeutics, in particular its lead asset BGB324, an Axl kinase inhibitor, which blocks the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT), which is a key driver in immune evasion, drug-resistance and metastasis in cancers.
BGB324 is currently being evaluated in a Phase 1b trial in patients with acute myeloid leukaemia (AML); and in a Phase 1b trial in patients with Stage IIIb and Stage IV non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

Led by Richard Godfrey, Chief Executive Officer, BerGenBio focuses on developing drugs for aggressive cancers. The company, which has expertise in understanding the biology of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT), a key pathway in immune evasion, acquired cancer drug-resistance and metastasis, is founded on proprietary platform technology, CellSelect™, to identify and validate novel drug targets and biomarkers.

In conjunction with the funding, BerGenBio also announced some changes to its Board of Directors. John Barrie Ward and David Wilson have stepped down from the Board. Stein H. Annexstad, Kari Grønås and Sveinung Hole have been appointed as new Non-Executive Directors. Susan Foden has stepped down as Chair but remains a Non-Executive Director, while Hilde Furberg has been appointed as Chair of the Board of Directors.

FinSMEs

18/03/2016

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