EpiBiologics – a biotechnology company advancing a next-generation antibody-based protein degradation platform and pipeline for membrane and extracellular drug targets – recently announced the company brought the total series A round to $73 million with the addition of $23 million from new investors Digitalis Ventures, Taiho Ventures, and existing investor Codon Capital. And in March, EpiBiologics launched its $50 million series A financing with participation from Mubadala Capital, Polaris Partners, Vivo Capital, and GV.
The company also announced that Ann Lee-Karlon, Ph.D., will join as Chief Executive Officer, President, and member of the Board of Directors. And Dr. Lee-Karlon will focus on expanding EpiBiologics’ proprietary EpiTAC platform, establishing value-driven collaborations, and building the company’s bispecific antibody protein degrader therapeutics pipeline.
Prior to EpiBiologics, Dr. Lee-Karlon served as Chief Operating Officer of Altos Labs. And she joined Altos at its initiation in 2021 and was instrumental in building the foundation for rapid growth to 500 employees across three global sites. Before Altos, Dr. Lee-Karlon spent over 18 years at Genentech, most recently as Senior Vice President. During her tenure at Genentech, she led portfolio strategy and operations and oversaw project leadership for over 80 drug development teams from research and development through FDA approval and global launch. She led major corporate partnerships and programs, including Ocrevus for multiple sclerosis and Rituxan in immunology. Dr. Lee-Karlon holds a B.S. in bioengineering from UC Berkeley, an MBA from Stanford University, and a Ph.D. in bioengineering from UC San Diego, where she was a National Science Foundation Fellow.
The company welcomes new members to its board of directors, including Samuel Bjork, partner at Digitalis Ventures, and Seiji Miyahara, Ph.D., senior investment director at Taiho Ventures. Board member Mitchell Mutz, Ph.D., of Vivo Capital, who led the company’s efforts to close the series A extension, will continue as the CFO of EpiBiologics.
KEY QUOTES:
“I had the pleasure of working with Ann at Genentech and am confident her deep experience building therapeutic pipelines and leading strategic collaborations will be invaluable as EpiBiologics progresses novel protein degrader therapeutics toward the clinic. We would like to thank Rami Hannoush for his leadership as co-founder and interim CEO and look forward to an exciting next stage of growth for EpiBiologics under Ann’s leadership.”
— David Schenkein, MD, general partner at GV
“EpiBiologics has developed a groundbreaking platform to target membrane and extracellular proteins, leveraging a novel atlas of tissue-specific degrader antibodies. Targeted extracellular protein degradation represents a new therapeutic modality with a wide range of applications, including cancer, immunology, and neurological diseases. I’m excited to work with the outstanding scientific team, advisors, and leaders to deliver new and important treatment options for patients in need.”
— Dr. Lee-Karlon, CEO of EpiBiologics
“EpiBiologics has made tremendous progress with its leading-edge EpiTAC platform, which will unravel the underlying intricacies of disease biology to build precision therapeutics. We are excited to work closely with Ann as the new CEO and the entire EpiBiologics team to bring the next generation of medicines to patients.”
— Samuel Bjork, partner at Digitalis Ventures
“With Ann’s strong track record in the biopharma industry, we are thrilled to join EpiBiologics’ syndicate of investors. We look forward to helping EpiBiologics continue to develop its novel bispecific antibody platform towards important treatments for a broad range of diseases.”
— Dr. Seiji Miyahara
