Med-Fine leads Series A for China's Degron Therapeutics
US and China-based biotech player Degron Therapeutics has closed a USD 22m Series A round led by Med-Fine Capital.
Jing Yu, a partner at Med-Fine, will join Degron's board, according to a statement. Other investors include Dyee Capital, Baidu Venture, and NeuX Capital, along with Degron's seed investors, Co-Win Ventures and Yuanbio Venture Capital.
Degron was co-founded in 2021 by Yong Cang, a professor at ShanghaiTech University, and industry veteran Lily Zou, previously CEO of Fosun Pharma USA and vice president of Fosun Pharma Group.
The company focuses on small-molecule medicines that target previously undruggable targets in oncology, inflammation, metabolic disease, rare diseases, and other therapeutic areas. It aims to be the global leader in molecular glue degraders.
Targeted protein degradation is an area of intense focus in drug discovery with an emerging class of small-molecule drugs that destroy rather than inhibit protein targets. Molecular glues are small molecules that act as adhesives by making two proteins bind each other, driving protein degradation.
Degron has created a molecular glue-based targeted protein degradation platform called GlueXplorer and developed a library of molecular glue compounds. GlueXplorer uses phenotypic screening, proteomic screening, and artificial intelligence to predict novel targets and accelerate compound discovery.
The Series A proceeds will be used to advance GlueXplorer. Degron currently has three pipeline programs including a target with essential roles in a broad range of cancers and immune diseases.
"Small-molecule drugs have been the mainstay of disease treatments, but most disease targets remain undruggable. Our GlueXplorer platform has already yielded several preclinical candidates in disease areas including cancer, inflammatory diseases, and rare diseases,” Zou said.
“Our team of accomplished entrepreneurs, scientists, and clinicians, is poised to usher in a step-change in how we treat undruggable targets to realize our goal of significantly improving patients' lives.”
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