PARP1–CNS Penetrant(Eikon)

▎药明康德内容团队编辑 Eikon Therapeutics今日宣布完成3.507亿美元D轮融资。自2019年成立以来，Eikon Therapeutics的私募融资总额已超过11亿美元。本轮融资由Eikon现有投资者领投，并有新投资者参与。参与此次融资的投资者包括Lux Capital、Alexandria Venture Investments、AME Cloud Ventures、The Column Group、E15 VC、Foresite Capital、General Catalyst、Soros Capital、StepStone Group、T. Rowe Price Associates旗下的基金及账户，以及UC Investments等。 Eikon Therapeutics正通过科学与工程的深度融合推进突破性疗法的研发。公司独有的技术平台结合曾获得诺贝尔化学奖的超分辨率显微技术、先进工程学和高性能计算，实现了对活细胞中蛋白质实时运动的精准可视化与定量测量，旨在为患有重大疾病的患者带来全新的治疗选择。 Eikon的临床管线包含其主打项目EIK1001，这是一款通过全身给药的Toll样受体7和8的共激动剂，目前正处治疗于晚期黑色素瘤的3期试验阶段。EIK1001已在多种肿瘤类型中展示了单药疗效，并在与抗PD-1与PD-L1药物联合治疗时呈现出良好的协同作用。Eikon同时还在推进EIK1003，这是一种具高度选择性的PARP1抑制剂，目前正于乳腺癌、卵巢癌、前列腺癌或胰腺癌患者中开展1期试验；以及EIK1004，这是一种可进入中枢神经系统的PARP1选择性抑制剂，该公司预计启动针对脑癌的1期研究。 在早期管线中，除其他未公开候选药物外，Eikon还拥有两种雄激素受体拮抗剂以及一种内部研发的WRN抑制剂（EIK1005），后者正被研究其在微卫星不稳定（MSI）高及其他携带DNA修复缺陷肿瘤患者中的潜在治疗作用。 ▲欲了解更多前沿技术在生物医药产业中的应用，请长按扫描上方二维码，即可访问“药明直播间”，观看相关话题的直播讨论与精彩回放 参考资料： [1] Eikon Therapeutics Secures $350.7 Million Series D to Advance Clinical-Stage Programs and Future Pipeline. Retrieved February 26, 2025 from https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250226281008/en/Eikon-Therapeutics-Secures-350.7-Million-Series-D-to-Advance-Clinical-Stage-Programs-and-Future-Pipeline 免责声明：药明康德内容团队专注介绍全球生物医药健康研究进展。本文仅作信息交流之目的，文中观点不代表药明康德立场，亦不代表药明康德支持或反对文中观点。本文也不是治疗方案推荐。如需获得治疗方案指导，请前往正规医院就诊。 版权说明：本文来自药明康德内容团队，欢迎个人转发至朋友圈，谢绝媒体或机构未经授权以任何形式转载至其他平台。转载授权请在「药明康德」微信公众号回复“转载”，获取转载须知。 分享，点赞，在看，聚焦全球生物医药健康创新

One of biotech’s best-funded startups has just raised a huge new round to take its lead drug into final-stage testing. On Wednesday, Eikon Therapeutics announced a $351 million Series D round, one of the biggest financings of the year so far. But in a sign of the times, investors and the Bay Area startup agreed to cut the company’s valuation from its 2023 round, showing that even biotechs with Eikon’s pedigree aren’t immune from market trends. “We had to adjust Eikon’s valuation to reflect this environment,” CEO Roger Perlmutter confirmed to Endpoints News . Perlmutter declined to disclose the new valuation beyond saying it “fairly reflects the state of the market.” Eikon had a $3.6 billion valuation following its Series C , according to PitchBook data. Despite the down-round, Perlmutter described Eikon as moving from “strength to strength” in advancing the Nobel Prize-winning microscope science at the heart of its 2019 founding. The company has built its own lab instruments to observe and analyze lit-up proteins moving inside living cells. It now has about 425 employees and is still growing. Its lead drug candidate, a TLR7/8 co-agonist called EIK1001, has started a Phase 3 study in skin cancer. And the broader pipeline is also progressing, Perlmutter said, with encouraging initial clinical results. “At this early point, these studies are looking very good, and we’re enthusiastic about that and eager to pour fuel on the fire,” Perlmutter said. The megaround ranks as biotech’s second largest raise so far in 2025, outranked only by obesity startup Verdiva Bio’s $411 million launch in January. The Series D syndicate was primarily made up of previous Eikon backers, like Lux Capital, The Column Group, Foresite Capital, Soros Capital, General Catalyst and others. Perlmutter said he wouldn’t be surprised if more investors join the Series D later this year. The press release described the $351 million as an “initial close” for the round. As for a potential IPO, Perlmutter framed going public as a matter of when, not if. “I am confident that Eikon Therapeutics will be a public company,” he said, describing the current IPO market as not completely dead. “There is room for special companies to go public, and we are a special company. Clearly, there is a lot of interest in the question of whether or not we can go public. We’ll choose the right time to do that as it makes sense.” Since Perlmutter joined as CEO in 2021, Eikon has become one of the largest biotech startups, as shown by its $518 million Series B in January 2022. Perlmutter previously led R&D at Amgen and Merck, and has recruited several Merck alumni to Eikon, including Roy Baynes as chief medical officer. While the microscopic technology is at Eikon’s core, the company in-licensed several drug programs in 2023 to jumpstart its pipeline. EIK1001, for example, was brought in from Seven and Eight Biopharmaceuticals, and the first advanced melanoma patient was identified in December for a registration-enabling Phase 3 study, Perlmutter said. Eikon also has a PARP1 inhibitor, EIK1003, in Phase 1 cancer studies, and a brain-penetrant version called EIK1004 that recently had its IND accepted by the FDA. And its first internal molecule is expected to enter the clinic “very soon,” Perlmutter said. Called EIK1005, that program inhibits an enzyme involved in DNA damage repair called the Werner syndrome helicase, or WRN. As for Eikon’s microscopes, Perlmutter said they’ve made its lab equipment smaller and more powerful over the past couple of years. But he wants to build a drug company, not sell microscopes, and he said the current research environment doesn’t support an instrument business. (Perlmutter had at one point considered creating a spinoff to sell the equipment.) “I say that because the funding for academic research is really under discussion now in Washington,” he said, referring to proposed policies like the cuts to NIH research grants. “It is not so easy for university investigators to see their way clear to adding additional expensive instrumentation to their research programs.” Eikon is also preparing to move in April across the San Francisco Bay from Hayward to Millbrae, CA. That’ll be a bit harder than for most biotechs, given the heavy and sensitive lab equipment that Eikon has built. “We’re gritting our teeth a bit,” Perlmutter said on the move. “These are all bespoke instruments that we have. We can’t just call up Mayflower and ask them to move. We actually have to pack them up ourselves and move them.”