Sheffield spin out company boosted by funding
A £350,000 investment has been made in Adjuvantix, a University of Sheffield spin-out company focused on developing vaccine technologies.
The company has attracted new investment of £250,000 from Yorkshire Cancer Research, while existing investors White Rose Technology Seedcorn Fund (WRTSF) and Fusion IP are providing follow on funding of £50,000 each.
Vaccines protect the body by safely mimicking disease. However, one of the major hurdles to generating effective cancer vaccines is overcoming tolerance. Tolerance occurs when the disease or a vaccine designed to prevent or treat the disease falls under the radar of the immune system and goes unnoticed. To overcome this tolerance, cancer vaccines will require an immune enhancing adjuvant which alerts the immune system to the presence of the vaccine and in turn the disease. Unfortunately, current adjuvants are often weak or have side effects.
Adjuvantix has designed an adjuvant system that it calls ADX40 for boosting the immune response to antigens. The company is currently focusing on developing new vaccines for cancer and tuberculosis (TB). The new funding will be used to conduct studies which will pave the way for clinical testing of cancer vaccines incorporating ADX40.
Andy Heath at Adjuvantix said: “We were delighted to receive the support of Yorkshire Cancer Research for our vaccine programme. We hope our technology will be a major impetus to the development of therapeutic cancer vaccines which will ultimately prove useful in the clinic.”
Dr David Milroy of Aberdeen Asset Managers who manage the White Rose Technology Seedcorn Fund said: “Adjuvantix is operating in a burgeoning field - the vaccine market is going through a renaissance, with a large number of products in development and significant M&A activity. Whilst at a relatively early stage we believe that the technology from Adjuvantix has the potential to enhance existing vaccines and create a new generation of therapeutic and prophylactic vaccines for previously intractable diseases.”
Morgan Williams, Commercial and Clinical Development Officer at Yorkshire Cancer Research said: “Having provided a pump-priming grant for the early stages of the ADX40 research, YCR is delighted to be able to help Adjuvantix further its cancer adjuvant development work. The charity continues to support cancer research outcomes with the prospect for significant patient benefit, and which show good potential. The ADX40 project meets those criteria.”
Commenting on this announcement, David Baynes, CEO of Fusion IP, said: ”This is great news for the company and we are delighted to be working with Yorkshire Cancer Research and WRTSF to support this exciting ADX40 research. Adjuvantix has the potential to have considerable future value.”
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Notes to Editors:
About White Rose Technology Seedcorn Fund
The White Rose Technology Seedcorn Fund is an early stage seedcorn fund, which invests in exciting new technology emerging from the universities of York, Leeds and Sheffield.
The £9 million Fund provides venture capital funding of up to £500,000 (and above for exceptional opportunities) to enable the transition from promising research work to commercial reality.
Its portfolio of investee companies represents the commercialisation of high quality science and technology combined with professional management teams to produce investor-ready and partner-ready opportunities. The Fund is supported by Yorkshire Forward and the Universities of York, Leeds and Sheffield, and managed by Aberdeen Asset Managers.
About YCR
Yorkshire Cancer Research (YCR) was founded in 1925 to fund research into the cause and cure of a variety of cancers.
YCR is the UK’s largest regional medical research charity, which funds research every year in the region’s five centres of research excellence at the Universities of Bradford, Hull, Leeds, Sheffield and York and their associated teaching hospitals.
About Fusion IP
Fusion IP plc, previously called BioFusion plc, was established in 2002 to commercialise university-generated IP. Fusion IP has signed long term agreements with two of the UK’s top ten research intensive universities, the University of Sheffield and Cardiff University, giving a combined R&D spend attributable to Fusion IP of approximately £166.8 million a year.
Fusion IP’s first agreement was a ten-year exclusive arrangement with the University of Sheffield for the commercialisation of IP owned by the University initially in the area of medical life sciences. This agreement was expanded in July 2008 to include the commercialisation of all non-life science research-generated IP, giving Fusion IP access to all of the University’s world class research in areas such as energy, engineering and electronics. Fusion IP has shareholdings in a portfolio of Sheffield University spin-out companies including Asterion, Axordia, Biohydrogen, Lifestyle Choices, Magnomatics and Phase Focus. The University of Sheffield was ranked 6th in the UK for the quality of its research and will be spending approximately £1 billion of research funding over the lifetime over the life of the Sheffield Agreement.
In January 2007, Biofusion completed a long-term exclusive agreement with Cardiff University, to commercialise 100% of all Cardiff University's research-generated IP. Biofusion has shareholdings in a portfolio of Cardiff University spin-out companies including Demasq, Q-Chip and Morvus. Cardiff University was ranked 7th in the UK in the most recent research rankings and will be spending more than £1.0bn of research funding over the lifetime over the life of the Cardiff Agreement.
Fusion IP also has a Memorandum of Understanding with Finance Wales, the provider of commercial funding to Wales-based SMEs, which outlines a strategy of co-investment in opportunities arising from the Cardiff University agreement.
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17 February 2009 |