Kaleido Biosciences Files for $100 Million IPO to Advance Novel Microbiome Metabolic Therapies for Urea Cycle Disorders
VCBeat (WeChat Official Account: vcbeat) has learned that healthcare company Kaleido Biosciences recently plans to raise $100 million through the issuance of common stock, although the final amount is expected to differ significantly from this preliminary figure.
Previously, Kaleido Biosciences secured $4.5 million in Series A financing in 2015 and $60 million in Series B financing in 2016. The company also raised $100 million in Series C financing in 2018, a round jointly led by Rock Springs Capital, Invus, Fidelity Management and Research Company, and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. To date, all funds raised by Kaleido Biosciences have been allocated to the research and development of its new technologies.
Kaleido Biosciences, founded in 2015 and headquartered in Lexington, Massachusetts, is currently advancing a microbiome metabolic therapeutics (MMTs) program targeting multi-indication diseases, while also endeavoring to develop novel technologies employing microbiome metabolic therapies for the treatment of urea cycle disorders.
Kaleido Biosciences Official Website Page
Urea Cycle Disorders refer to conditions in which a congenital defect in one of the enzymes of the urea cycle impairs the conversion of ammonia into urea, leading to the accumulation of free ammonia in the body, resulting in hyperammonemia, and clinically manifesting as severe brain dysfunction.
To date, microbiome therapeutic strategies have primarily focused on increasing or decreasing bacterial populations through catabolic and anabolic processes. For instance, Synlogic, a U.S. company, has developed an engineered strain of Escherichia coli that helps patients with urea cycle disorders “remove” toxins that their bodies are unable to eliminate. In contrast, Kaleido Biosciences is the first company to employ a chemically driven therapeutic approach, which modulates the metabolic output and distribution of the microbiome by influencing the function and distribution of existing microbes within the host.
The head of the MMTs project stated, “Our initial MMT candidates targeted glycans, but the candidate pipeline is now expanding. MMT products will be a novel class of proprietary compounds designed for selective metabolism in the gut following oral administration. We are advancing testing of MMTs across multiple therapeutic areas, and this entirely new therapeutic modality holds the potential to be faster and more cost-effective than traditional drug development.”
Rock Springs Capital is an investment firm based in Baltimore, Maryland, whose advisory activities include providing secure portfolio management services and investment portfolio management for corporations or institutions.
Invus is an investment firm founded in 1985, managing over $4 billion in assets across its evergreen funds, with offices in New York, London, Paris, and Hong Kong.
Fidelity Management and Research Company is an investment institution focused on the financial sector, with diversified investment management insights and extensive investment experience.
ADIA is a seasoned investment firm whose investment decisions are grounded in the long-term, sustainable economic objectives of its portfolio companies, with the aim of achieving stable returns within predefined risk parameters over the long term.