ExoRNA Bio Secures Tens of Millions in Angel+ Round to Advance Its Proprietary Third-Generation In Vivo Self-Assembled Exosome Delivery Platform for CNS-Targeted RNA Therapeutics

Recently, ExoRNA Bio, a company focusing on the globally leading third-generation in vivo self-assembling exosome delivery RNA nucleic acid drug technology, announced the completion of an angel+ round of financing worth tens of millions. This round of financing was led by the well-known institution Yuexiu Industrial Fund, with investments from Jingxin Pharmaceutical, Dingxin Capital, and the Biomedical Industry Alumni Association of Nanjing University, while the original shareholder CDH Investments continued to invest and increase its stake. Powertide Capital served as the exclusive financial advisor for this round.

It is reported that the proceeds of this round of financing will be mainly used to accelerate the industrial transformation of the company's technology platform, and simultaneously advance the IND application for ExoRNA Bio’s first self-developed pipeline targeting Huntington's disease this year.

Public information shows that ExoRNA Bio, established in early 2022, is committed to developing more products that can benefit patients with unmet clinical needs in actual treatment, especially therapeutic drugs for central nervous system diseases, aiming to build a platform-type RNA innovative drug enterprise.

Yuexiu Industrial Fund Managing Partner and President, Lu RongRepresentation: The global cell and gene therapy sector is rapidly developing and is expected to become the third major pillar of the biopharmaceuticals industry, following small-molecule targeted drugs and large-molecule biologics. ExoRNA Bio is committed to achieving breakthrough therapeutic technologies in fields with significant unmet clinical needs, such as central nervous system (CNS) diseases, to develop small nucleic acid drugs. We are delighted to lead the investment in ExoRNA Bio, recognizing the company's technological innovation and the advantages of integrating industry and research. We believe that the management team’s years of academic expertise and extensive industrial experience can drive the clinical implementation of a globally innovative self-assembled exosome delivery technology, addressing both the challenges of nucleic acid delivery and crossing the blood-brain barrier for CNS diseases. In the future, Yuexiu Industrial Fund will practice enabling investments, integrate industry chain resources, promote industrial alignment between ExoRNA Bio and its portfolio companies, and continue to build an investment ecosystem for the cell and gene therapy industry.

According to predictions by market intelligence firms EvaluatePharma and BCG, the RNA nucleic acid therapeutics market size will reach $8.6 billion in 2024, with a CAGR of approximately 35% from 2018 to 2024. Nucleic acid drugs are also expected to become the third major type of drug following small molecule drugs and antibody drugs.

However, the translational application of nucleic acid drugs is currently severely limited by their in vivo delivery issues, making it difficult to effectively reach the target site. It can be said that the delivery system is the guarantee for nucleic acid drugs to stably exert their targeted therapeutic effects, and has also become the biggest obstacle affecting their drugability.

In response, Professor Zhang Chenyu, the founder of ExoRNA Bio, ingeniously utilized human organs and tissues as bioreactors to "process" and produce active forms of siRNA, which are then assembled into exosomes generated by these "bioreactors." Through this method of transportation using exosomes secreted by endogenous cells, siRNA is protected during transport across cellular and biological barriers while maintaining excellent biocompatibility. The third-generation nucleic acid delivery technology platform developed by ExoRNA Bio ensures the safety of nucleic acid drug delivery and achieves a breakthrough in the challenge of "no effective extrahepatic delivery system for nucleic acid drugs." Additionally, this technology platform completely avoids issues associated with the high cost, quality control difficulties, instability, susceptibility to degradation, and insufficient supply that arise when exosomes are used as carriers produced in vitro. Even at extremely low dosing concentrations, the drugs developed by ExoRNA Bio can exert potent effects in vivo. Moreover, leveraging the company’s strengths in synthetic biology engineering, ExoRNA Bio can also enable drugs to carry multi-gene components with targeting capabilities, ultimately delivering them to different organs via exosomes.

"Professor Zhang has always been known as a 'scientific fanatic' in our Nanda community, and innovative scientific research has always been the focus of Professor Zhang's research team. We have high hopes for this research achievement by Professor Zhang’s team and believe it will surely be successfully transformed." Jinyan Jin, representative of the Nanjing University Biomedical Industry Alumni Association, also expressed support for ExoRNA Bio's academic research.

"If there is no professional industrialization team to cooperate, then even the most cutting-edge and excellent technology might remain stuck in the laboratory stage forever." Professor Zhang Chenyu stated, "I am very grateful to Dr. Meng Xia for partnering with me to push the third-generation in vivo self-assembling exosome delivery technology from laboratory research to clinical application, benefiting more patients as soon as possible and realizing the purest significance of this innovative technology."

It is reported that Dr. Xia Meng, CEO and co-founder of ExoRNA Bio, has accumulated more than 20 years of working experience in multinational biotechnology enterprises. She once led the team to complete the research and development of three first-class innovative drugs of virus vector type and obtained approval for clinical trials. It can be said that Dr. Xia Meng, with international vision and new drug development experience, has accelerated the transformation of Professor Chenyu Zhang's research results.

Under the leadership of Dr. Mengxia, ExoRNA Bio rapidly built an industrial team with rich industrialization experience from scratch within a year of official operation and began complementary cooperation with Nanjing University's research. In the nucleic acid drug "Challenge Leader" technology breakthrough project released by the National Biomedicine Innovation Center in 2022, the "Exosome Delivery Technology Platform for Nucleic Acid Drugs Targeting the Central Nervous System," led by Dr. Mengxia of ExoRNA Bio, was successfully selected as one of the "Key Projects." Within this short year, relying on a highly efficient team that combines industry and research, ExoRNA Bio completed numerous animal efficacy and toxicology experiments for its Huntington's disease pipeline and simultaneously initiated the Orphan Drug Designation (ODD) application process with the FDA.

ExoRNA's highly efficient execution team also surprised Deng Ning, a partner at Dingxin Capital, who participated in this round of financing. He stated: "We are very surprised by the execution ability of the team under the leadership of Dr. Mengxia. It is rare to see such clear goal planning and strong execution ability in early-stage project teams, which has also given us more confidence in investing in this project. Despite the dual pressures of a capital winter and the pandemic, ExoRNA Bio has been able to push forward resolutely, advancing its pipeline projects step by step as expected, demonstrating the resilience of the team. We at Dingxin Capital firmly believe that with the driving force of combining industry and research, ExoRNA Bio will surely develop drugs that benefit patients and bring hope to them."

Dr. Dan Liu, Senior Partner of CDH Investments Innovation and GrowthThey also stated: "The progress and results achieved by ExoRNA Bio in the past year have given us shareholders great confidence and warmth. The recognition and affirmation of this advanced technology in the industry and regulatory assessments, along with the team’s efficient and rapid advancement of the pipeline despite the pandemic, may soon bring breakthrough results in multiple neurological diseases, including Huntington's disease. We have high expectations for the scalability and replicability of this platform. As investors, we are willing to support the clinical translation of truly original leading Chinese technologies and help ExoRNA Bio benefit more patients worldwide as soon as possible."

ExoRNA's first R&D pipeline targets Huntington's disease, a rare autosomal dominant genetic disorder. Patients with this condition often experience neurological dysfunction, as well as motor, cognitive, and psychiatric abnormalities. Current medications and surgical treatments can only alleviate some symptoms but cannot achieve a complete cure. The pathogenic mechanism of Huntington's disease involves the abnormal aggregation of mutated huntingtin protein (mHTT) into large molecular clusters within cells, leading to neuronal death. Therefore, reducing mHTT protein is the fundamental therapeutic strategy for this disease.

"Based on the results of earlier animal experiments, ExoRNA's technology platform has the potential to overcome the challenges in treating central nervous system diseases. We have also initiated the orphan drug designation process for our Huntington’s disease pipeline with the U.S. FDA. We believe this technology can enter the global market and gain worldwide recognition," said Dr. Meng Xia. "In the future, ExoRNA Bio will continue to focus on unmet clinical needs in the field of central nervous system diseases by utilizing its unique third-generation in vivo self-assembling exosome delivery system. Our goal is to build a world-leading platform-based RNA innovative drug company and realize the ideal of serving patients and society through technological innovation."

Guangzhou Yuexiu Industrial Investment Fund Management Co., Ltd. was established in 2011 as an investment management platform under Yuexiu Capital. To date, it has managed funds exceeding tens of billions of yuan. After years of market-oriented and professional development, the company has formed a business layout with one core (fund-of-funds investment) and two wings (equity investment and mezzanine investment), growing into a leading industrial capital operator in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. In the biopharmaceutical field, the company drives investments through in-depth research, continuously integrating resources within the biopharmaceutical industry to empower invested companies and contribute to building a robust biopharmaceutical ecosystem. The company has so far invested in over 50 biopharmaceutical enterprises. In the cell and gene therapy sector, its high-quality investments include Sirnaomics (2257.HK), Immorna, ExoRNA Bio, and Refine Biotechnology.

Zhejiang Jingxin Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (Stock Code: 002020) was established in 1990. It is a pharmaceutical listed company integrating research and development, production, and sales. The company follows the business policy of "Strengthening the pharmaceutical core business and developing medical devices," adheres to the core corporate values of "Pragmatism, Innovation, Inclusiveness, and Win-Win," takes "Dedicated to Safeguarding Health" as its mission, and is committed to becoming a leader in the fields of psychiatry, neurology, and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular in China.

Dingxin Capital was founded in 2014. The core team members have a strong composite background in both finance and industry. With the corporate mission of promoting social progress through investment, the firm focuses on early-stage and specialized investments in healthcare and hard technology. It has led and participated in early investments for nearly 40 high-quality projects and has been ranked on important industry lists such as "China's Best Early-Stage Venture Capital Institution," "Best Investment Institution in Healthcare," and "China's Best Early-Stage Investment Institution in Semiconductors and Integrated Circuits." Dingxin Capital currently manages over 10 billion yuan in cumulative assets under management. Its investors include government-guided funds, insurance companies, listed companies and their shareholders, large enterprise groups, market-oriented mother funds, and other institutional investors. In both 2021 and 2022, it was consecutively included in the highest A-Class rating list for private equity fund managers invested by insurance funds.