Vivace Therapeutics Announces $30 Million Series C Financing to Fund Clinical Programs Targeting the Hippo Pathway

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Dec 16, 2020, 06:00 ET

SAN MATEO, Calif., Dec. 16, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Vivace Therapeutics, Inc., a small molecule discovery and development company developing first-in-class therapies targeting the Hippo pathway, announced today the closing of a $30 million Series C financing. The company anticipates advancing its clinical candidate into first-in-human studies in early 2021, targeting tumors dependent on activated YAP. The Series C financing was led by Boxer Capital with participation from new investor RA Capital Management alongside existing investor Canaan Partners. With the financing, Dr. Norman Zhou of Boxer Capital has joined the board of directors at Vivace.

"We are honored to welcome Boxer Capital and RA Capital Management to our team and to have their support. The Hippo pathway has generated much interest, and we are excited to have discovered a portfolio of diverse chemical classes of compounds with excellent in vitro and in vivo activities. To the best of our knowledge, we will be the first company to take a molecule into the clinic targeting this novel pathway," said Sofie Qiao, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of Vivace Therapeutics.

"We see tremendous opportunity for the Hippo pathway and are excited to support the Vivace team as it progresses its development candidate through the clinic to address this unmet medical need." said Aaron Davis, Chief Executive Officer of Boxer Capital, LLC.

"For nearly a decade we have been tracking efforts to drug the YAP pathway, which we believe is a key driver of tumorigenesis and acquired drug resistance," commented Jake Simson, Principal, RA Capital Management. "We are excited to join this high-quality investor syndicate and partner with the Vivace management team, which has a deep track record of developing transformative precision oncology medicines, to bring the first TEAD inhibitor into the clinic."

Vivace Therapeutics's compounds inhibit palmitoylation of members of the transcriptional enhanced associate domain (TEAD) protein family. Pre-clinical research and development activities show that the clinical candidate is active as a monotherapy and in combination with other anti-cancer therapies against tumors that rely upon dysfunction of the Hippo pathway.

About Vivace Therapeutics, Inc.

Vivace Therapeutics is a small molecule drug discovery and development company focused on targeting the Hippo pathway. The company is pursuing several first-in-class drug candidates to treat human carcinomas of high unmet medical need. Based in San Francisco Bay Area, the company has raised $70 million to date, and is funded by leading biotechnology investors, including Canaan Partners, WuXi Healthcare Ventures, Cenova Capital, Sequoia Capital China, Boxer Capital and RA Capital Mangement. For more information, please visit www.vivacetherapeutics.com.

About Boxer Capital of Tavistock Group

Boxer Capital is a private biotechnology investment fund based in San Diego, California that invents and invests in new therapeutics across multiple indications in order to create value through improved patient care and outcomes. Founded by the life sciences team at Tavistock Group in 2005, Boxer Capital invests in private and public companies representing the entire drug development lifecycle from early-stage preclinical discovery assets to late-stage clinical and commercial stage companies. For more information, please visit www.boxercap.com.

About RA Capital Management

RA Capital Management is a multi-stage investment manager dedicated to evidence-based investing in public and private healthcare and life science companies that are developing drugs, medical devices, and diagnostics. The flexibility of its strategy allows RA Capital Management to provide seed funding to startups and to lead private, IPO, and follow-on financings for its portfolio companies, allowing management teams to drive value creation from inception through commercialization. For more information, please visit https://www.racap.com.

Contact Information
Sofie Qiao, Ph.D.
President and CEO
[email protected]
650.666.2753

SOURCE Vivace Therapeutics, Inc.