Cellenkos Secures $15 Million Series A Financing to Advance Transformative Cell Therapy Platform

VCBeat has learned that Cellenkos, a clinical-stage biotechnology company, recently announced the completion of a $15 million Series A financing round. Led by BioVeda Capital Management (BVCF), the proceeds will be used to further develop its regulatory T cell (Treg) therapy platform to address the significant unmet needs in autoimmune and inflammatory diseases.

Cellenkos was founded in 2016 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas, USA. It was co-founded by Dr. Simrit Parmar, a tenured associate professor in the Department of Lymphoma/Myeloma and Experimental Therapeutics at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and Golden Meditech Holdings Limited.

Cellenkos is dedicated to developing off-the-shelf umbilical cord blood cell therapies for the treatment of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. The company’s CRANE™ platform, an umbilical cord blood Treg cell therapy technology licensed from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, currently features CK0802 and CK0804 as its lead product candidates.

Among them, CK0802 is a novel allogeneic cell therapy product composed of lung-homing regulatory T (Treg) cells derived from umbilical cord blood units, indicated for the treatment of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS); CK0804 consists of a novel subset of bone marrow-homing allogeneic Treg cells, indicated for the treatment of myelofibrosis.

Regarding this round of financing, Dr. Parmar, Co-Founder of Cellenkos, stated“We are honored and delighted to welcome BioVeda Capital (BVCF) as a new investor. Looking ahead, we will remain focused on the development of novel Treg cell therapies, with the aim of benefiting patients in need around the world.”

Dr. Yang Zhi, Managing Partner of BVCF, the lead investor in this round, stated“Cellenkos’s innovative Treg cell therapy platform, designed to address autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, has the potential to significantly meet unmet patient needs. We are delighted to lead this financing round and support their groundbreaking work.”

Headquartered in Houston, Texas, Cellenkos is a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on the development and commercialization of transformative novel allogeneic Treg cell therapies for the treatment of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. Cellenkos’ proprietary CRANE™ platform generates tissue-targeted, activated, and enriched Treg cells that leverage cellular intelligence to seek out, localize to, proliferate within, and resolve tissue inflammation.

Cellenkos’ robust product pipeline addresses unmet needs in the fields of inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. Safety and early efficacy data for CK0801 in the treatment of aplastic anemia and other cytopenias (NCT03773393) will be presented at the American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting on December 13, 2021.

Cellenkos has completed a multicenter, placebo-controlled, randomized, double-blind clinical trial (NCT04468971) of CK0802 in patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome induced by COVID-19 (CoV-ARDS). The results will be presented as an oral report at the ASH Annual Meeting on December 13, 2021.

Furthermore, Cellenkos plans to collaborate with Incyte (NASDAQ: INCY) to conduct a Phase 1b add-on therapy trial of CK0804 for the treatment of patients with myelofibrosis who have an inadequate response to ruxolitinib (Jakafi®), as well as a Phase 1b trial of CK0803, a novel neuron-homing allogeneic Treg subset, for the treatment of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

BioVeda Capital (BVCF) is an international private equity fund focused on China’s life sciences industry, investing in growth-stage healthcare companies worldwide with a particular emphasis on innovative solutions that address unmet health needs in China. BioVeda Capital actively assists business owners and entrepreneurs in building their companies into world-class enterprises. Headquartered in Shanghai, BioVeda Capital has offices in Beijing and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of China.