New company for immunometabolism research
A new biopharmaceutical company, Sitryx, has launched, with the goal of developing disease modifying therapeutics in immunometabolism. It recently announced the closing of its Series A financing round, and the raising of US$30 million from a syndicate of specialist international healthcare investors co-led by SV Health Investors and Sofinnova Partners and including Longwood Fund and global healthcare company GSK.
Immunometabolism involves investigating the role of metabolic pathways in immune cell function. As changes to these pathways have been shown to be pivotal in the development of a number of severe diseases, including a range of cancer and autoimmune conditions, researchers hope that correcting immune cell function through immunometabolic therapies has the potential to offer key, complementary and highly differentiated approaches to treating disease.
Sitryx has a portfolio of projects that address oncology and immuno-inflammatory indications, and its proprietary science is supported through close working with GSK’s drug discovery and chemistry experts. It was co-founded by scientists in the US and Europe, including: Houman Ashrafian, Partner at SV Health Investors; Luke O’Neill, Professor of Biochemistry, School of Biochemistry and Immunology at Trinity College Dublin; Jonathan Powell, Professor of Oncology and Associate Director, Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, Johns Hopkins University; Jeff Rathmell, Professor of Cancer Biology and Director, Vanderbilt Center for Immunobiology; Michael Rosenblum, Assistant Professor, UCSF School of Medicine; and Paul Peter Tak, former Chief Immunology Officer and Senior Vice-President at GSK and Professor of Medicine at Amsterdam University Medical Centre.
“Immunometabolism is an extremely exciting and compelling scientific area and, at Sitryx, we have seen that modulation of these key cellular pathways has broad therapeutic potential across multiple disorders with unmet medical need, particularly in the areas of immuno-oncology and immuno-inflammation,” said Neil Weir, CEO of Sitryx. “We are delighted to welcome leading specialist investors to the company, which further validates the strength of our scientific expertise and ambitions. Together with our proprietary chemistry, deep biological insights and world leading team of immunometabolism experts, Sitryx is well positioned to become a leader in immunometabolism.”