Dermtreat bags €16.2m financing

The funding round was led by Sofinnova Ventures, Novo Seeds and Lundbeckfonden Emerge as well as business angels acted as co-investors. The company has invented a mucosal patch – made from PVP and Eudragit RS100 as fiber-forming polymers – delivering medicines unidirectionally to the mucosa. Rivelin is an electrospun, two layer patch including a muco-adhesive layer, which includes the drug and a protective layer ensuring uni-directional, long-term drug delivery into the mucosal lesion. The product is bio-degradable, whereby it ultimately dissolves in the mouth and stomach.

Dermtreat said funds will be used to advance its Rivelin Clobetasol Patch, a patch that releases the glucocorticoid clobetasol to treat oral lichen planus (OLP), to Phase IIb testing. The trial enroling 30 patients will be started in Q2/2017 and is going to be conducted in Munich, Bonn and Düsseldorf, Germany. The company’s second product, the Rivelin Plain Patch, is as a mechanical barrier occluding mucosal ulcers and inflammation.

Funds will also be used to expand the company's product portfolio by covering other therapeutic targets of the Rivelin patch. “This is an opportunity rarely seen as the Rivelin patch addresses a large currently unmet therapeutic area covering a wide range of medical needs – as is also strongly evidenced by key opinion leaders within dermatology and oral medicine”, said Lars Ekman, Executive Partner at Sofinnova, who will join the board of Dermtreat ApS, as will Stephan Christgau, Partner at Novo Seeds and Christian Elling, Managing Partner at Lundbeckfonden Emerge.