Draupnir Bio ApS raises further equity

Draupnir Bio ApS has raised further €12m in an equity investment led by MP Healthcare, the investment arm of Mitsubishi Tanabe, and the Export and Investment Fund of Denmark (EIFO) to extend the field of targeted protein degradation (TPD) to extracellular and membrane-bound protein targets. The new investment follows a Series A round in 2019 led by  Gilde Healthcare Partners, Inkef Capital and Novo Holdings brings the total money raised by the Danish-German spin-out to €42m.

The biotech start-up, co-founded by Professors Simon Glerup, Camilla Gustafsen, Peder Søndergaard Madsen (University Aarhus), and Peter Seeberger (MPI of Colloids and Interfaces, Potsdam) uses the ubiquitous lysosomal receptor sortilin to take up disease-causing extracellular and membrane-bound protein targets. The company’s proprietary sortilin-based lysosome targeting chimera (SORTAC) technology consists of a small molecule part that binds to sortilin with a linker region and a small molecule part that binds to the extracellular disease protein. This ternary complex is then brought into the cell where the disease protein is degraded. The sortilin and the SORTAC are then recycled, enabling further rounds of protein degradation.So far, targeted protein degradation has used the proteasome to label cytosolic protein targets for degradation, that make up only 60% of the human proteome.  Draupnir Bio ApS’ lysosomal degradation platform thus closes the gap to target the 40% of extracellular and membrane protein for protein degradation.

The proceeds from the new financing will be used to advance Draupnir’s preclinical pipeline of oral protein degraders that target undruggable extracellulare and membrane proteins.