- Triplet Therapeutics, a biotechnology company harnessing human genetics to develop treatments for repeat expansion disorders at their source, announced it raised $59 million
Triplet Therapeutics — a biotechnology company harnessing human genetics to develop treatments for repeat expansion disorders at their source — announced it has raised $59 million in funding, including a $49 million Series A round of funding led by MPM Capital and Pfizer Ventures U.S. LLC, which is the venture capital arm of Pfizer. Atlas Venture — which co-founded and seeded Triplet with a $10 million investment — also participated in the Series A alongside Invus, Partners Innovation Fund, and Alexandria Venture Investments.
Launched in 2018 by Nessan Bermingham, Ph.D. (serial biotech entrepreneur and venture partner at Atlas Venture) along with Atlas Venture and Andrew Fraley, Ph.D., Triplet has a goal of pursuing a transformative approach to developing treatments for repeat expansion disorders — which is a group of more than 40 known genetic diseases associated with expanded DNA nucleotide repeats. And a significant body of human genetic evidence has identified that one central pathway — known as the DNA damage response (DDR) pathway — drives onset and progression of this group of disorders, including Huntington’s disease, myotonic dystrophy, and various spinocerebellar ataxias.
Triplet is developing antisense oligonucleotide (ASO) and small interfering RNA (siRNA) development candidates for precisely knocking down key components of the DDR pathway that drive repeat expansion. And this approach operates upstream of current approaches in development while targeting the fundamental driver of these diseases. By reducing the activity of select DDR targets, Triplet’s approach is designed for halting onset and progression across a wide range of repeat expansion disorders.
And Triplet Therapeutics also fully assembled a senior management team of industry veterans. Bermingham has nearly two decades of experience leading life science startups and is a co-founder of Intellia Therapeutics and Korro Bio. Senior vice president of development Irina Antonijevic, M.D., Ph.D. previously led translational medicine and early development at Wave Life Sciences. Senior vice president of computational biology & statistics Brian Bettencourt, Ph.D. came to Triplet from Translate Bio where he led modeling and design of oligonucleotide and mRNA therapeutics.Senior vice president of technology David Morrissey, Ph.D. previously led technology development and delivery of CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing candidates at Intellia Therapeutics. Chief financial officer Eric Sullivan, CPA is bringing experience leading financial operations at Gemini Therapeutics and bluebird bio. And senior vice president & general counsel Jeffrey Cerio Pharm.D., J.D. served as senior corporate counsel at Moderna before joining the Triplet team.
“We’re excited to launch Triplet today to transform the treatment of repeat expansion disorders,” explained Bermingham. “This milestone would not have been possible without the contributions of thousands of patients, whose participation in genetic research has enabled us to build a fundamentally new understanding of the cause of these diseases. With this financing, we are positioned to rapidly advance our initial development candidates toward the clinic for patients.”
With this round of funding, Triplet plans to use progress its first development candidates into IND-enabling studies as well as to advance natural history studies to inform its clinical development plan and contribute to the scientific understanding of repeat expansion disorders.
“More than 40 repeat expansion disorders have been identified, and most of these diseases are severe with limited to no treatment options,” commented Jean-Francois Formela, M.D., partner at Atlas Venture and Board Chair of Triplet. “We have built Triplet to fundamentally transform what has been the treatment strategy for these diseases up to now.”
The company board of directors includes:
– Nessan Bermingham, Ph.D., co-founder, president and CEO of Triplet Therapeutics;
– Jean-Francois Formela, M.D., partner at Atlas Venture and chair of the Board of Directors;
– Shinichiro Fuse, Ph.D., partner at MPM Capital;
– Douglas Kerr, M.D., Ph.D., executive vice president, chief development officer at Generation Bio; and
– Laszlo Kiss, Ph.D., Pfizer Ventures partner.
And the company also set up a Scientific Advisory Board comprised of leading investigators for repeat expansion disorders, including:
– Sarah Tabrizi, Ph.D., – Professor of clinical neurology at University College London
– Jim Gusella, Ph.D., – Bullard Professor of Neurogenetics at Harvard Medical School and
– Vanessa Wheeler, Ph.D. – Associate professor of neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School.
