Biotech company Tenpoint Therapeutics has landed $70m (£54m) in Series A investment to continue developing eye therapeutics.
Based in London, Switzerland, France and the US, the biotech firm is working on cell-based therapeutics plus in vivo reprogramming for degenerative ocular diseases.
Tenpoint Therapeutics said it will use the proceeds of the Series A round to fund work on its regenerative medicine platform.
Eddy Anglade, MD, CEO of Tenpoint Therapeutics, said: “Cell-based therapeutics represent an ideal modality for degenerative ocular diseases since most vision loss results from damaged or missing tissue.”
Thanks to recent progress in the field, Anglade says it is now possible for the modality to be used in clinical trials and on a larger basis.
“At Tenpoint, we are focused exclusively on the eye and on harnessing recent advances in regenerative biology to advance our therapies as we work to change the future for people with vision loss by addressing its underlying causes,” said Anglade.
All prior backers in the biotech’s seed round returned for the large Series A, such as F-Prime Capital, Sofinnova Partners, Qiming Venture Partners USA, Eight Roads and the UCL Technology Fund.
They were joined by British Patient Capital, which supplied £10m, the latest biotech investment by the British Business Bank subsidiary after it invested £10m into the drug development platform OMass Therapeutics in May.
Tenpoint Therapeutics’ was conceived from research carried out at Moorfields Eye Hospital, University College London Institute of Ophthalmology, Institut de la Vision in Paris and the University of Washington.
David Guyer, MD, chair of Tenpoint Therapeutics and CEO of EyeBio said: “Tenpoint has great potential to lead ophthalmology into a new era which will fully replace cells lost to degenerative conditions rather than merely endeavouring to slow the processes that drive vision loss.”
“This offers the potential for more complete restoration of sight and for curative treatments able to eliminate the underlying cause of disease.”