Lexeo Therapeutics isn’t wasting any time. The gene therapy biotech, which emerged in January with an all-star team of industry veterans, has raised $100 million to advance a pipeline of treatments for genetic cardiovascular and central nervous system conditions.
The series B fundraising comes barely two months after Lexeo snapped up three heart disease programs through the acquisition of Stelios Therapeutics. The financial details of that deal were kept secret, but Lexeo emerged from stealth at the beginning of the year with $85 million and a wealth of preclinical and clinical programs primarily developed at Weill Cornell Medicine.
The latest round was led by D1 Capital Partners and Eventide Asset Management, with additional backing from about a dozen new and existing investors.
Lexeo plans to put the funds toward its newly expanded pipeline, which includes the cardiac-focused gene therapies from Stelios plus therapies for Alzheimer’s disease, Friedreich’s ataxia and CLN2 Batten disease.
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The biotech is currently studying the genetic underpinning of Alzheimer’s, with the goal of unraveling what causes the devastating neurological disorder. A phase 1/2 clinical trial is underway for cases linked to the APOE4 gene, which has been linked to greater dementia risks.
Stelios, meanwhile, has brought treatments for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy into the fold, with the latest proceeds supporting the continued development of that work as well. Another 13 programs in the discovery phase have yet to be revealed.
Lexeo CEO Nolan Townsend told Fierce Biotech in January that the company sees a future for gene therapies beyond rare diseases. It has built out a pipeline to address larger diseases, while also taking on a couple of rare ones through the Friedreich’s ataxia and Batten disease programs.