Octagon Therapeutics, a Cambridge, MA-based preclinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing antibiotics for multi-drug resistant infections, closed a seed financing round of undisclosed round.
Backers included from a group of angel investors and family offices.
The seed financing will allow Octagon to expand the scientific team and to accelerate preclinical development activities.
Led by President and Chief Operating Officer, Isaac Stoner, Octagon has developed a drug discovery platform, which, based upon work done in Fred Ausubel’s lab at MGH, focuses on the identification of novel metabolic pathways that power pathogenic bacteria.
Using this platform, the company has identified promising small molecule inhibitors of these critical targets in resistant bacteria.
Octagon’s lead program is based on the optimization of an older medicine, which has previously been shown to be safe in man as well as effective for an unrelated indication. Identified with its discovery platform, this compound has shown a high level of activity against resistant Gram-negative pathogens in animal infection models, including Acinetobacter baumanii and Pseudomonas aeruginosa, regarded as among the hardest to treat bacterial pathogens.
Incorporated in 2016 after obtaining exclusive access to foundational intellectual property developed at MGH, the company is focused on treating infections caused by the most dangerous “ESKAPE-group” bacterial pathogens. Octagon has established R&D operations at the Pagliuca Life Lab.
Octagon’s Scientific Advisory Board includes Dr. Ausubel, Dr. Jim Collins (MIT), Dr. Eric Brown (McMaster University), and Dr. Eletherios Mylonakis (Brown University).
FinSMEs
15/02/2018