RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. – Lumena Pharmaceuticals has secured $45 million in Series B financing.
The startup founded by Pappas Ventures of Durham is developing a new diabetes treatment based on the role bile acids play as signaling agents in the gastrointestinal tract.
When Lumena launched its fund-raising efforts in 2011, CEO Michael Grey explained that most gastric bypass surgery patients are type 2 diabetics. In 80 percent of those patients, blood glucose levels normalized within days – a change that’s not attributed to weight loss. What happened was that bile was diverted.
In total, Lumena has raised a total of $78 million in institutional funds to date. The latest round comes from existing investors such as Pappas Ventures, RiverVest Venture Partners and Alta Partners, as well as new investors New Enterprise Associates, Adage Capital Management and RA Capital Management.
Lumena will use the funding to advance its lead product candidate, a treatment for rare cholestatic liver disease in children and adult patients, as well as its candidate for nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Currently, there are no available treatments for NASH, which is a liver condition that can lead to cirrhosis and impacts between 2 and 5 percent of Americans, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
“Lumena has made significant progress in the three years since the company was founded, advancing our lead candidate through development in multiple Phase 2 clinical trials in patient populations with rare cholestatic liver diseases and significant medical needs,” said Grey. “This funding will support the continued development of LUM001 in our ongoing global clinical programs as well as a planned Phase 2 clinical trial of LUM002 to be initiated later this year in patients with NASH, a significant and growing patient population for which there are currently no approved treatments.”
Lumena’s technology comes from company co-founder Slava Gedulin, a former scientist at Amylin Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: AMLN), a San Diego, California biotechnology company that develops diabetes and obesity treatments. Gedulin’s discovery came after he left Amylin and the company has no claims on Lumena’s technology.
