Atai Life Sciences Closes $43M Series B Financing

atai life sciencesAtai Life Sciences, a Berlin, Germany- London, UK- and New York-based biotech platform dedicated to curing mental health disorders, completed its series B financing round of $43m (€38m).

The round was led by Michael Auerbach’s New York-based Subversive Capital, with participation from new and existing investors, including Apeiron Investment Group, Bail Capital, and Efrem Kamen, founder of Pura Vida Investments.

The company intends to use the new funds to further invest in its platform technology, to develop the existing drug pipeline, and to acquire additional compounds.

Founded in 2018 by Christian Angermayer, Lars Wilde and Florian Brand, Atai Life Sciences is a global biotech platform and company builder. It takes a decentralized and big data platform approach to drug development – leveraging expertise, access to talent, financial resources and technology, thereby accelerating the pace at which compounds move through early stage clinical trials.

The company focuses on developing paradigm-shifting and formerly stigmatized compounds with prior evidence for efficacy and safety in humans. Its initial focus is on developing solutions for the more than 300 million people who suffer from depression.

In January, Atai acquired Perception Neuroscience and is now developing an arketamine therapy for neuropsychiatric diseases. It is also the largest investor in Compass Pathways, which is developing psilocybin therapy for treatment-resistant depression and has received Breakthrough Therapy designation from the FDA.
In addition to drug compounds, the company’s portfolio includes Innoplexus, which delivers big data and AI solutions to big pharma and biotech companies and provides the technology Atai will use to power its in-house drug discovery and development.

The company launched with initial seed backing totalling $12.6m (€11.2m) from Apeiron Investment Group (Christian Angermayer’s family office), German investor HCS, Galaxy Financial (the family office of Mike Novogratz), and Ekaterina Malievskaia and George Goldsmith (Co-Founders of COMPASS Pathways).
In September 2018, Atai completed a Series A financing round in the amount of $24.4m (€21.6m).

FinSMEs

28/03/2019

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