Spyre Therapeutics raises $180 million to advance anti-inflammatory drugs
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Dive Brief:
- Spyre Therapeutics, a biotechnology spinout working on antibody drugs for diseases of the gut, announced Friday a $180 million fundraising from a group of blue-chip investors.
- In June, Spyre launched as a publicly traded company when it entered a reverse merger agreement with Aeglea BioTherapeutics in a stock-for-stock deal. The company was known as Aeglea until it decided to rebrand as Spyre Therapeutics in November.
- While still in the preclinical stage, Spyre is working to develop more effective antibody drugs for inflammatory conditions such as inflammatory bowel disease, or IBD. One candidate targets a protein known as TL1A that’s recently become a top target for drugmakers.
Dive Insight:
Many drugmakers are looking to develop more effective drugs for immune conditions like IBD. Notably, drugs that can target the protein TL1A have attracted significant dealmaking this year.
This summer, Merck & Co. agreed to buy Prometheus Biosciences for $10.8 billion, giving it access to an experimental TL1A drug candidate for the regulation of inflammation and fibrosis. The drug produced positive results when tested in two types of IBD.
Similar deals have popped up in the months since. Sanofi entered a partnership with Teva to develop its gut disease drug, while Roche acquired a TL1A therapy from Roivant Sciences.
Spyre’s pipeline consists of experimental drugs targeting the a4b7 receptor, IL-23 protein and TL1A. Its a4b7 candidate is farthest in the pipeline and could compete with Takeda’s Entyvio.
Its experimental drugs targeting a4b7 and TL1A are expected to enter human testing in 2024.
Spyre formed as a spinout from antibody developer Paragon Therapeutics, which last year split off another immune disease drugmaker named Apogee Therapeutics. Its merger with Aeglea in June was accompanied by a $210 million fundraising.
As part of the private investment in public equity, or PIPE, deal, Spyre is selling 6 million shares of its common stock for $15 per share. The company is also selling 150,000 shares of its Series B preferred stock at $600 per share.
The deal, which is expected to close next week, will extend Spyre’s cash runway into the second half of 2026, the company said.
