Table 1 Top 10 A rounds in 2013 for innovative startups
From: Innovative startups 2013
Company | Amount raised ($M); date; investors | Scientific founders | Other | Technology |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Juno Therapeutics (Seattle) | $120; Dec. 4; Arch Venture Partners, Crestline Investors | Renier Brentjens, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC); Phil Greenberg, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (FHCRC) and the University of Washington; Michael Jensen, University of Washington School of Medicine; Stan Riddell, FHCRC and the University of Washington School of Medicine; Isabelle Rivière and Michel Sadelain, MSKCC | Hans Bishop, Juno CEO and former executive in residence at Warburg Pincus; Larry Corey, president and director of FHCRC; Richard Klausner, senior vice president and chief medical officer of Illumina, chairman of Audax Health; Robert Nelsen, managing director of ARCH Venture Partners | Engineered chimeric antigen receptor adoptive T cell therapy against cancer |
Spark Therapeutics (Philadelphia) | $50; Oct. 22; The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) | Jean Bennett, University of Pennsylvania; Beverly Davidson, University of Iowa; Katherine High and J. Fraser Wright, CHOP | Jeffrey Marrazzo, Spark president and CEO, industry entrepreneur | AAV gene therapies against blindness and hemophilia |
Jounce Therapeutics (Cambridge, Massachusetts) | $47; Feb. 14; Third Rock Ventures | James Allison and Padmanee Sharma, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center; Thomas Gajewski, University of Chicago; Drew Pardoll, Johns Hopkins University; Louis Weiner, Georgetown University | Not applicable | Immunomodulatory therapeutics against cancer |
Effector Therapeutics (San Diego) | $45; May 20; US Venture Partners, Abingworth Management, Novartis Venture Funds, SR One, Astellas Venture, Osage University Partners, Mission Bay Capital | Davide Ruggero and Kevan Shokat, University of California, San Francisco | Steve Worland, formerly CEO of Anadys; Siegfried Reich, formerly research fellow at the Lilly Biotech Center in San Diego; Kevin Eastwood, formerly senior vice president of corporate development at Anadys | Small molecule translation regulators in cancer |
Mitokyne (Boston) | $45; Oct. 7; Astellas Pharma, MPM Capital, Longwood Founders Fund | Johan Auwerx, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne; Andrew Dillin, University of California, Berkeley; Ronald Evans, Salk Institute for Biological Studies; H. Robert Horvitz, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); Jodi Nunnari, University of California, Davis | Kazumi Shiosaki, managing director of MPM Capital | Small molecule enhancers of mitochondrial function |
Editas Medicine (Boston) | $43; Nov. 25; Flagship Ventures, Polaris Venture Partners, Third Rock Ventures, Partners Innovation Fund | Feng Zhang, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard; George Church, Harvard Medical School (HMS); Jennifer Doudna, University of California, Berkeley; Keith Joung, Massachusetts General Hospital and HMS; David Liu, Harvard University | Kevin Bitterman, interim president of Editas Medicine and principal at Polaris Partners | Gene editing and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) and transcription activator–like effector nuclease (TALEN) technology |
GenSight Biologics (Paris) | $41.6; April 8; Novartis Venture Funds, Abingworth Management, Versant Ventures, Index Ventures | José-Alain Sahel, Pierre and Marie Curie University; Botond Roska, Friedrich Miescher Institute; Jean Bennett, University of Pennsylvania; Luk Vandenberghe, Harvard University; Serge Picaud, Vision Institute | Bernard Gilly, previously chairman and CEO of Fovea Pharmaceuticals | AAV2 gene therapies against blindness and retinal degenerative diseases |
Sideris Pharmaceuticals (Boston) | $32; Oct. 22; MPM Capital, Hatteras Venture Partners, Osage University Partners | Raymond Bergeron, University of Florida | Thomas Neenan, chief technology officer and former CEO of Viscus Biologics | Lead is an orally active, small molecule, iron-chelating drug candidate |
Audentes Therapeutics (San Francisco) | $30; July 18; OrbiMed Advisors, 5AM Ventures, Versant Ventures | Thomas Schuetz, formerly VP of clinical affairs at TKT, which pioneered the gene activation platform | Matthew Patterson, former entrepreneur-in-residence with OrbiMed Advisors | AAV gene therapy against X-linked myotubular myopathy, Pompe disease and other rare muscle diseases |
Syros Pharmaceuticals (Watertown, Massachusetts) | $30; April 11; Arch Venture Partners, Flagship Ventures, WuXi PharmaTech Corporate Venture, private investors | Richard Young, MIT; James Bradner, HMS and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute; Nathanael Gray, HMS and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute | Cofounded with ARCH Venture Partners and Flagship's VentureLabs unit | Gene expression; Syros is working with a new class of gene control elements it calls super-enhancers and applying them to cancer |
