PsiThera Secures $47.5M Series A to Advance Oral Small Molecule Therapies for Inflammatory and Autoimmune Diseases

December 10,Watertown, Massachusetts – PsiThera, a company leveraging biologically relevant protein states and computational intelligence to create oral medications for diseases long constrained by injectable treatments, announced the completion of a $47.5 million Series A financing round and the appointment of Eric Shaff as Chief Executive Officer. The equity financing round was led by Samsara Biocapital and Lightstone Ventures, with participation from other top-tier investors, including Roivant, YK Bioventures, Eurofarma Ventures, and others. Formerly known as Psivant Therapeutics, PsiThera initially spun out of Roivant and now operates as a fully independent company.

PsiTheraCEO Eric Shaff stated:"PsiThera integrates predictive computational power, biophysics, mechanobiology, and drug hunter expertise into a continuous feedback loop. The company aims to leverage the best computational tools to address the rate-limiting challenges of difficult small-molecule targets. The progress of our lead program, from identifying novel chemical scaffolds to lead optimization within four months, demonstrates the operational efficiency of our discovery engine and its potential to accelerate the delivery of new therapies to patients. Supported by the deep expertise of our investors and entire team, PsiThera will further expand our approach, broadening the scope of what oral drugs can offer and addressing high-value targets in innovative ways."

The company's QUAISAR™ Computational Intelligence Platform originated from Dr. Sherman’s founding role at Silicon Therapeutics and has been refined over many years at Roivant Discovery, leveraging quantum chemistry, molecular dynamics, machine learning, and supercomputing to simulate the behavior of proteins and drugs in biological environments. PsiThera’s discovery ecosystem unites world-class experts in structural biophysics, mechanobiology, and computational modeling to optimize oral medications for clinically validated targets long considered accessible only by biologics.

The company is rapidly advancing a series of novel therapies aimed at modulating high-value targets, with initial projects focusing on the Tumor Necrosis Factor (TNF) superfamily. PsiThera's platform achieves rapid cycle times, transitioning from hit identification to lead optimization in four months, highlighting its ability to translate complex physical and AI-driven insights into actionable design decisions.

Dr. Christina Isacson, Partner at Lightstone Ventures and Chairman of the Board at PsiThera, stated:"PsiThera exists at the intersection of advanced capabilities aimed at creating tangible products and the next frontier of biotechnology development. The company's superior computational power, scientific rigor, closed-loop integration, target selection strategy, and top-tier team enable PsiThera to rapidly achieve differentiated therapeutic breakthroughs with the potential to make a meaningful impact on patients' lives."

PsiTheraFounder and Chief Innovation Officer Woody Sherman, Ph.D., stated:"When it comes to challenging targets where molecular motion plays a critical role, traditional drug discovery methods have significant limitations. The integration of our proprietary predictive computational models with human feedback from drug hunters possessing deep domain expertise accelerates the discovery of novel drugs with optimized properties and superior therapeutic potential."