Copenhagen, Denmark, 11 October 2023 – MinervaX ApS, a privately held Danish biotechnology company developing a novel, prophylactic vaccine against Group B Streptococcus (GBS), has today announced the completion of EUR 54 million upsized financing. The financing includes investment from new investors EQT Life Sciences and OrbiMed, with participation from existing investors Novo Holdings, Pureos Ventures, Sanofi Ventures, Trill Impact Ventures, Adjuvant Capital, Wellington Partners, Industrifonden, Sunstone LifeScience Ventures, and LF Invest. Vincent Brichard of EQT Life Sciences and Tal Zaks of OrbiMed will join the MinervaX Board of Directors.
GBS is a leading cause of life-threatening infections in newborns as well as adverse pregnancy outcomes such as preterm delivery and stillbirths. Current prophylactic measures provide insufficient protection, meaning there is an urgent need to accelerate the development of a GBS vaccine. A video describing the unmet medical need for a GBS vaccine and details of MinervaX’s novel GBS maternal vaccine can be found on the Company’s website, here : https://youtu.be/HvkRJBqsjjY.
The Company is currently progressing two Phase II clinical trials in 470 pregnant persons across Denmark, United Kingdom, Uganda and South Africa. Initial data from these clinical trials are highly positive and demonstrate that the vaccine has an acceptable safety profile, is highly immunogenic and gives rise to functionally active antibodies. Details of MinervaX’s clinical trials can be found at clinicaltrials.gov under the identifiers NCT04596878 and NCT05154578. In addition to pregnant persons, MinervaX is also pursuing Phase I development of its novel GBS vaccine in Older Adults, under identifier NCT05782179.
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