Antabio extends Series A financing round

Antabio — a biopharma specialising in the development of novel antibacterial treatments — has extended its Series A financing round with an additional €5.2 million from new investors to add to the €7.3 million raised in the first closing last year.

The new funding, from Omnes, BNP Paribas Développment and Sham Innovation Santé, will be used to accelerate the development of Antabio’s novel inhibitor of bacterial metallo ß-lactamases (MBLs). These will be combined with a carbapenem to fill an important gap in the treatment of drug-resistant infections.

“We are thrilled to welcome Omnes, BNP Paribas Développement, and Sham Innovation Santé to Antabio,” said Marc Lemonnier, CEO of Antabio. “We have built a strong international team of experts to combat the most urgent unmet medical needs in the antibacterial space. This extension to our series A, coupled with the substantial non-dilutive funding received from CARB-X, provides solid financial means for Antabio to take our innovative program into the clinic and move closer to this goal.”

“Antibiotic resistance is one of the great challenges of our time,” commented Claire Poulard, associate at Omnes. “At Omnes, we were impressed by the innovative approach taken by the company to fight drug-resistant infections and we are delighted to support their strong international team to accelerate the development of their programs to the clinic.”

The €12.5 million series A financing complements the CARB-X grant of up to $8.9 million awarded to Antabio in July 2017 to support the company’s Pseudomonas Elastase Inhibitor programme (PEI) for the treatment of chronic Pseudomonas infections in Cystic Fibrosis patients.