Money will be used to move lead candidate Orph-001 into the clinic.
Orphazyme closed a €14 million ($19.6 million) series A financing round. Proceeds will go toward advancing the company’s lead program, Orph-001, into clinical development. Aescap Venture joined existing investors Novo and Sunstone Capital in the round.
Orphazyme develops treatments for lysosomal storage diseases and has two projects in preclinical development. Orph-001 is a recombinant version of human HSP70. It is currently being tested in vivo in animal models in collaboration with academic laboratories.
Orphazyme is based on discoveries of its scientific founders, Marja Jäättela, M.D., and Thomas Kirkegaard Jensen, Ph.D., a postdoc at the Danish Cancer Society (Kræftens Bekæmpelse). Novo provided grant funding before becoming a shareholder and was a founding investor in Orphazyme.
