AstronauTx has announced the completion of a £48m Series A financing to create new treatments for Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

As part of the investment led by the Novartis Venture Fund, the financing was supported by several global venture investors, including Brandon Capital, Bristol Myers Squibb, EQT Life Sciences from the LSP Dementia Fund and MPM Capital with support from the Dementia Discovery Fund.

All proceeds from the Series A financing will be used to develop the London-based biotech company, AstronauTx, and advance its portfolio of small-molecule drugs, including a clinical study of AD patients as a lead programme.

Dr Marianne Uteng, managing director at the Novartis Venture Fund, said: “The founders and investors include world experts in neuroscience, and the founder’s discovery is thought to have potential in halting disease progression and improve patients’ quality of life.”

Jonathan Tobin, partner at Brandon Capital, said: “We are pleased to join the impressive syndicate of investors backing AstronauTx in its mission to create therapies that are expected to provide not only symptomatic but also disease-modifying benefits in Alzheimer’s and other neurological diseases, an area of high unmet need but where recent breakthroughs are offering new hope.”

The company will work on oral drugs that could be “applicable across multiple neurodegenerative conditions,” said its co-founder, Dr Ruth McKernan.

First launched in 2019, AstonauTx was created by the Dementia Discovery Fund with an additional £6.5m in seed funding provided from the UCL Technology Fund and the UK Future Fund, to develop novel drugs to correct the disrupted physiology of the brain by improving the support function of astrocytes, an important cell type in the brain.

In July 2023, AstronauTx announced its partnership with Danish biotechnology company Saniona to identify new treatments by modulating a novel, undisclosed ion channel target.

The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) has recommended Bayer’s Nubeqa (darolutamide) plus androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) in combination with docetaxel, as well as its Stivarga (regorafenib) as a monotherapy, for use within NHS Scotland for eligible cancer patients.

Following the accelerated regulatory approval by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency under Project Orbis and the SMC’s recommendation, the Nubeqa regimen will be available to treat metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC).

With around 3,394 new cases in Scotland in 2020, prostate cancer is the most common cancer in males.

Additionally, Stivarga will become available in Scotland for adult patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) who have previously been treated with, or are not eligible for, available therapies, including fluoropyrimidine-based chemotherapy, an anti-VEGF therapy and an anti-EGFR therapy.

The recommendation for Nubeqa follows a submission assessed under the orphan medicines process and results from the phase 3 Arasens clinical trial, which showed that oral darolutamide and ADT in combination with docetaxel led to a significantly reduced death risk of 32.5% in mHSPC patients.

Antonio Payano, chief executive officer of Bayer UK and Ireland, said the recommendation “opens the doors to patients in Scotland who may be eligible to benefit from this innovative treatment, following the early access we agreed with NHS England at the end of 2022.”

Chiara De Biase, director, support and influencing, at Prostate Cancer UK, said: “We’ll continue to engage with healthcare professionals and researchers to help establish which men most benefit from this approach, so that every man gets the most effective treatment tailored to his disease.”

In November 2022, Nubeqa and ADT in combination with docetaxel was the first triple combination treatment to be made available by the NHS England for mHSPC patients.
Most recently, Cancer Research UK announced a £123m investment in Scotland to support research into new and improved cancer treatments and diagnosis, as well as bolstering Scotland as a major global hub for cancer research.