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news.Clinical-stage immuno-oncology firm Forty Seven has completed the first half of a committed $75m Series A financing round.
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Lightspeed Venture Partners and Sutter Hill Ventures led the round with participation from Clarus Ventures and GV (formerly Google Ventures).
Forty Seven has also licensed the rights from Stanford University to several immuno-oncology programs.
The license includes rights to more than 100 issued or pending US or foreign patents that cover the antibody Hu5F9-G4 and various other novel immune checkpoint inhibitors and cancer-specific antibodies.
Forty Seven will use the financing to continue the clinical development of its lead molecule, Hu5F9-G4, a humanized monoclonal antibody against human CD47 that potentially has applications spanning several tumor types and treatment modalities.
The proceeds will also be used to complete the two ongoing clinical trials, fund further studies in 2016 to evaluate Hu5F9-G4 in combination therapy and advance several preclinical programs towards IND.
Forty Seven founder Irv Weissman said: "Targeting CD47 integrates the adaptive and innate immune systems, creating synergy with existing cancer-specific antibodies like rituximab, cetuximab and trastuzumab through ADCP, and potentially with T-cell checkpoint inhibitors through cross-presentation.
"We are grateful to the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) for funding the preclinical studies and the current solid tumor clinical trial at Stanford, and to Ludwig Cancer Research for funding much of the research."