Israel's PolyPid raises $22M after a couple of failed IPO attempts

Israeli drug developer PolyPid is moving on from a pair of IPO misfires, raising $22 million in venture financing to advance its pipeline of antibiotic treatments.

The company, headquartered in Petah Tikva, raised cash from new investor Shavit Capital and repeat backer Aurum Ventures, putting together a Series D round to get its lead drug into Phase III.

PolyPid's top prospect is D-Plex, which is a granular bone substitute filled with the antibiotic doxycycline, implanted after surgeries to ward off bacterial infections. D-Plex is designed to gradually mete out its therapeutic payload over several weeks, which the company believes will help it beat out traditional postsurgical antibiotics.

With its latest fundraise, PolyPid plans to take D-Plex into Phase III in the U.S., targeting postcardiac surgery sternal infections, which the company said have a 40% mortality rate.

Behind D-Plex is BonyPid-1000, a synthetic bone substitute also loaded with bacteria-killing doxycycline. That implant is in the midst of a study to support European approval, and PolyPid expects to wrap up the trial next year.

The company's D round follows two aborted efforts to go public in 2014 and 2015. PolyPid first sought to raise $22 million in a Nasdaq offering, later scaling back its ambitions to $20 million before scrapping the idea altogether.

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