Nuowei Bio Completes RMB 50 Million Pre-B Financing to Advance Oncology-Focused Nucleic Acid Therapeutics

VCBeat learned that recently, NEWISH announced the completion of a 50-million-yuan Pre-B round of financing. This round of financing was jointly invested by Wuxi Xintou Jinshi Venture Capital Management Co., Ltd. and Focus (Beijing) Private Equity Fund Management Co., Ltd. The funds raised will be used to accelerate the clinical research of NEWISH's new anti-tumor nucleic acid drugs developed based on the STARi platform, expand the professional team, and develop a globally pioneering and disruptive anti-tumor new drug pipeline.

NEWISH, as a biotech innovation company specializing in gene therapy, focuses on unmet clinical needs with a unique commercial perspective and continuously conducts "China-originated" nucleic acid drug research of the First-in-class type with complete independent intellectual property rights. The company's R&D team is led by Academician Jiang Jiandong and guided by authoritative experts from the CDE of the National Medical Products Administration. The core technical leaders include Dr. Liu Defang and Dr. Qi Hailong, two "Science and Technology New Stars" talents of Beijing University, along with over ten high-caliber postdoctoral researchers and Ph.D. talents from prestigious institutions such as Peking University, Tsinghua University, Nankai University, University of Science and Technology of China, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, as well as senior industrialization professionals deeply engaged in clinical medicine registration (with master's and Ph.D. talents accounting for nearly 70%).

NEWISH's team, with complementary strengths and efficient collaboration, has achieved two Class 1 new drug IND approvals from scratch in the past three years (the third IND has been accepted). They have obtained over 40 invention patents in areas such as cell and gene therapy, nucleic acid drugs, and cancer vaccines. Additionally, they have published six SCI papers as the first or corresponding author unit and received significant special funding support from the Beijing Municipal Science & Technology Commission.

With profound strength and past successful experience, NEWISH has laid out multiple product R&D pipelines. Two core products with relatively rapid progress have entered the clinical research stage this year: the therapeutic DNA nucleic acid drug NWRD06 for liver cancer received clinical approval from the CDE of the National Medical Products Administration in May 2023, and the therapeutic DNA nucleic acid drug NWRD08 for HPV has completed a 7-case IIT study, showing good safety and leading efficacy data in the industry. The formal IND application for NWRD08 has been accepted by the CDE and is expected to be approved for clinical trials within the year.

Dr. Defang Liu, CEO of NEWISHExpressed: We are very grateful for the trust and support from Wuxi Xintou Jinshi Venture Capital Management Co., Ltd. and Focus (Beijing) Private Equity Fund Management Co., Ltd. in NEWISH's technological innovation R&D capabilities, clinical development capabilities, and future commercialization capabilities. This collaboration with the two fund management companies will inject new momentum into our company and lay a solid foundation for the clinical research of our core products and the development of new pipelines. NEWISH is in a phase of rapid development, with the STARi platform technology demonstrating a continuous ability to output new pipelines and scalability. We will further integrate resources from multiple parties to accelerate the drug R&D and commercialization process.

Chen Feng, President of Focus (Beijing) Private Equity Fund Management Co., Ltd.NEWISH is focused on areas with strong clinical needs but relatively or absolutely lacking treatment options. With excellent data and a capable team, we really like this kind of company. Both equity investment and product development require a combination of long-term commitment and focus. We are pleased that both Focus (Beijing) Private Equity Fund Management Co., Ltd. and NEWISH have found common ground in the principles of "long-term commitment and focus."

General Manager of Wuxi Xintou Jinshi Venture Capital Management Co., Ltd., Cao XiNEWISH's core R&D team is passionate, resilient, bold in thought and action, steady and methodical, highly execution-driven, and capable of both original innovation and full-chain new drug development. Meanwhile, the company founder has extensive clinical expert resources in China, excels at maximizing value with limited resources, and leads a clinical registration and R&D team with strong collaboration skills to ensure efficient and rapid progress of core pipelines. We look forward to the company accelerating new drug R&D and team building after this round of investment, and Wuxi Xintou Jinshi Venture Capital Management Co., Ltd. will continue to support NEWISH’s development.

Focus (Beijing) Private Equity Fund Management Co., Ltd. concentrates on research in the field of life science and technology innovation, with the mission of discovering emerging technology companies that create unique social value. It primarily invests in early-stage equity projects in the life science and technology industry. Since 2018, the Focus Fund team has been dedicated to the preclinical stage of innovative drug development, consistently adhering to addressing unmet clinical needs as the starting point. The team is committed to identifying new drugs with genuine international clinical differentiation. In the past, it has led investments in companies such as New Element Pharmaceuticals in Jiangsu, Maxin Pharmaceuticals, and Junhemei Bio. The LPs of the Focus Fund include large state-owned science and technology investment groups, state-owned financial institutions, and other institutional investors.

Wuxi Xintou Jinshi Venture Capital Management Co., Ltd. ("Xintou Jinshi" for short) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Wuxi New District Technology Finance Venture Capital Group Co., Ltd. Xintou Group is a functional, specialized comprehensive investment group focusing on regional industrial development and technological innovation and entrepreneurship investment. It is a founding member of the China Technology Entrepreneurship Association and the China SME Technology Investment Alliance, a founding member and vice president unit of the Jiangsu Venture Capital Association, a vice chairman unit of the Jiangsu Angel Investment Alliance, and a director unit of the Wuxi Economic Society. It is one of the four major venture capital groups in Jiangsu Province. Xintou Jinshi currently manages a direct fund size exceeding 8 billion yuan, including the New Momentum Mother Fund with a scale of 6 billion yuan. It has cooperated with leading capital to participate in 15 functional funds, with a total scale of nearly 50 billion yuan. Multiple enterprises it has invested in have achieved leapfrog growth in valuation.