Company plans to market vaccine discovery platform.

Genocea Biosciences completed a $23 million series A financing round led by SR One, the corporate venture arm of GlaxoSmithKline.

Founding investors, Lux Capital Management, Polaris Venture Partners, and Morningside Ventures, were joined by new investors, Auriga Partners, Cycad Group, and Alexandria Real Estate Equities, in the funding.

Genocea’s pipeline includes vaccines for chlamydia and pneumonia as well as three other undisclosed targets. All are in the preclinical stage of development.

“Novel prophylactic and therapeutic vaccines are one of the most important unmet needs in global health,” says Russell Greig, president of SR One. “Genocea has a one-of-a-kind technology, strong business model, and an outstanding team for developing vaccines against many of the world’s remaining disease targets.”

Under the financing deal, the company will appoint executive director Staph Leavenworth Bakali as its new CEO. Bakali replaces Genocea co-founder, Robert Paull, who will stay on the company’s board of directors.

Bakali was a COO in two companies eventually acquired by GlaxoSmithKline: ID Biomedical for $1.4 billion and Powderject Pharmaceuticals for $930 million.ADNFCR-2184-ID-19035546-ADNFCR

Previous articleOpsona Closes $23M Financing Round
Next articleEisai Licenses Bial’s Antiepileptic Drug for European Market for $120M