Recently, Guangdong Maijinjia Biotechnologies Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: MJJ Biotech) announced the completion of its Series A financing round, with investors including Guangzhou Science City Investment Group and Guangzhou Development Zone Business Development Group Co., Ltd.
It is reported that the funds from this round of financing will help advance relevant pipelines and expand the R&D team, further broadening and deepening the technological moat, and transforming MJJ Biotech into a more systematic and efficient Blockmir new drug development engine.
Guangdong Maijinjia Biotechnologies Co., Ltd. was established on August 14, 2019, founded by a team with over 20 years of experience in the fields of small molecule RNAs, modified oligonucleotides, patents, clinical trials, biotechnology, and business management. The company holds full independent intellectual property rights to the Blockmir R&D technology platform. Jesper Wengel, a member of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and the founder of Locked Nucleic Acid (LNA), serves as the chairman of the Academic Committee. Professor Hans Thorleif Møller, the Chief Scientific Officer, has been introduced to Huangpu through China's national talent recruitment program, where he is deeply engaged in biopharmaceutical R&D in Guangzhou. Servier, an internationally renowned pharmaceutical company that was among the first to enter the Chinese market and has witnessed the entire process of China’s reform and opening-up, signed a research and development cooperation agreement with the company. The aim is to jointly develop a new therapy for protein-related diseases in rare neurodegenerative conditions based on the Blockmir technology platform.
MJJ Biotech has developed the Blockmir nucleic acid drug research and development technology and the Dosevo nucleic acid drug screening technology. The company owns the global rights to all related patents, rather than temporary or regional usage rights. At the same time, the company has applied for extensive patent protection for the Blockmir technology worldwide, with a broad patent portfolio in Europe, North America, China, and Japan. This portfolio covers the entire platform (327 miRNAs and all their mRNA targets), second-generation modification patterns, and several individual BlockmiRs targeting specific sites. It also includes a method for screening Blockmirs from large libraries with or without conjugates, forming an impenetrable patent protection wall. Absolute control over the full intellectual property rights of the Blockmir technology patents allows the company to maintain the initiative, which is undoubtedly crucial for its next phase of development.
MJJ Biotech, building on the 15 years of research achievements by Academician Jesper Wengel's team, has established a drug screening platform based on Blockmir technology with an efficient and tightly patented protection wall. Multiple animal experiments have confirmed the effectiveness of Blockmir technology; completed the Blockmir mouse brain distribution test, confirming that Blockmir drugs can reach almost all parts of the brain and enter various functional cells; confirmed that Blockmir can indeed upregulate protein expression in mice (target for central nervous system diseases); partially confirmed the half-life of Blockmir drugs, etc.
In addition to the platform, MJJ Biotech has up to eight R&D pipelines, including cavernous malformation, acute respiratory distress syndrome, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, Parkinson's disease, rare central nervous system diseases, aging, and hepatitis C. The Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, is collaborating with MJJ Biotech to develop a new therapy for protein disorders in rare neurodegenerative diseases based on the Blockmir technology platform. Cell experiments are nearing completion, and animal experiments are about to commence. The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University is also collaborating with MJJ Biotech on nucleic acid drug research targeting acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), which has entered the animal testing phase, with currently positive data obtained. In addition, the platform has established early research pipelines for liver and central nervous system diseases and has already selected targets for these research pipelines, establishing a direct link between genes and diseases.
Currently, most of the nucleic acid drugs under research on the market function by down-regulating mRNA, which can only cover 50% of diseases; the other 50% of human genes are negatively regulated by microRNA, including almost all diseases such as cancer, immune system disorders, metabolic diseases, etc., which arise due to this regulation. Up-regulation can restore the expression of proteins that are lost due to negative regulation. Therefore, in principle, all these major categories of diseases can become therapeutic targets for Blockmir technology, representing a huge clinical demand.
MJJ Biotech has reached a milestone cooperation with the French pharmaceutical company Servier, which is a collaboration involving an upfront payment of nearly 2 million euros plus 35 million euros. Servier’s feedback indicates that the patented technology can initially be developed into a drug. It has currently passed the mid-term assessment of Servier's go/no-go decision. The meeting minutes show that Servier recognizes MJJ Biotech's patented technology and expressed its intention to continue investing in research and development. Servier has provided its own equipment to MJJ Biotech's Denmark laboratory as experimental apparatus and assigned technical personnel for on-site assistance to accelerate the R&D process.
MJJ Biotech Co-founder and CEO Zhai Jiajie stated: "With the support of this round of financing, we will rapidly advance the relevant pipelines, submit an IND application by 2026, and expand our R&D team to further broaden and deepen our technological moat, transforming MJJ Biotech into a more systematic and efficient Blockmir new drug development engine."