Fountain Therapeutics Announces $15 Million Series A-2 Financing
Brings total Series A financing to $26 million
Funds to support expansion of leadership team, continued R&D activities and pre-clinical research
SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 18, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Fountain Therapeutics (“Fountain”), a biopharmaceutical company building a pipeline of disease-modifying therapeutics for chronic degenerative diseases, today announced a $15 million Series A-2 financing, which brings its total Series A funding to $26 million. Eli Lilly and Company, Alexandria Venture Investments and R42 Group participated as new investors, joining existing investors Khosla Ventures and Nan Fung Life Sciences.
“We are thrilled to welcome Eli Lilly and Company, Alexandria, and R42 as Fountain investors and honored to have the support from these distinguished institutions for our unique drug discovery platform and approach,” said William Greene, M.D., chief executive officer of Fountain Therapeutics. “The chronic diseases that so often accompany aging are key and growing challenges to life, health and healthspan. By combining deep cell biological insight with the very latest computer vision, artificial intelligence and machine learning, we have the ability to identify cellular biologic age and other potential risk factors for disease. We have already identified novel biology around known targets and potential new insights into chronic disease states that may lead to new therapies. We look forward to building on our positive momentum as we continue to build our insights, platform and pipeline.”
Thomas Rando, M.D., Ph.D., founder and chairman of the board of Fountain, noted, “Fountain is an example of a biotech company emerging as a direct result of basic research, in this case the biology of aging. The company’s screening and discovery platform is built upon foundational research showing that the age of a cell can be modulated by factors in the cell’s environment. By identifying compounds that work through these pathways, we seek to restore youthful resilience to cells and tissues, leading to therapies that treat or even prevent chronic diseases of aging.”
Alex Morgan, M.D., Ph.D., partner at Khosla Ventures, added, “We are excited about Fountain’s AI driven approach to drug discovery and are confident in the team’s ability to build its platform and pipeline. Fountain has an opportunity to address several large chronic degenerative diseases associated with aging for multiple indications with high unmet medical need.”
Proceeds from the financing will be used to expand Fountain’s platform, pipeline and team as it enters its next phase of growth.
About Fountain Therapeutics
Fountain Therapeutics is a biopharmaceutical company building a pipeline of disease-modifying therapeutics for chronic degenerative diseases. The company’s cell-based AI-driven technology platform leverages recent developments in machine learning and computer vision, along deep insight into the biology of aging, to enable precise mapping of cellular biologic age, a marker of resilience and health. The platform enables extraction of cellular features that provide extensive insight into the aging process of cells, which may lead to identification of novel targets and disease biomarkers. Fueled by the expertise of leaders in aging research and computation, Fountain has turned these insights and technology into an unbiased drug discovery and development engine that introduces a new avenue for the discovery and advancement of therapies for chronic degenerative diseases.
For more information, please visit fountaintx.com and follow the company on Twitter: FountainTx.
Media Contact:
Patrick Bursey
LifeSci Communications
(646) 970-4688
pbursey@lifescicomms.com
