Tactiva takes $35m series A on board

Tactiva Therapeutics, a US-based immuno-oncology spinout of Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, obtained $35m yesterday in an initial series A tranche led by venture capital firm Panacea Venture.
Vi Ventures and Efung Capital also participated in the round, which Tactiva previously said would target $50m.
Founded in 2016, Tactiva Therapeutics is working on a T-cell medicine platform called dual-enhanced adoptive cell therapy (Deact) that empowers T-cells in the immune system to kill cancerous bodies.
Deact differs from other T-cell therapies in that it focuses on the CD4 subtype and the tumour-fighting CD8 subtype. CD4 is believed to assist with the attack of cancerous cells.
Deact also reprograms patient-derived haematopoietic stem cells to add T-cell receptors identified through Tactiva’s research, in the process creating a long-term source of T-cells.
Tactiva will use the capital to aggressively drive its clinical development program as it looks to demonstrate its effectiveness in tackling multiple myeloma, a form of bone marrow cancer, as well as certain solid tumour cancers.
The company operates from University of Buffalo’s New York State Center for Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences, which is situated at the Niagara Medical Campus.
Tactiva also works closely with the university’s Buffalo Institute for Genomics and Data Analytics, and has previously received grant funding from the Buffalo Center for Advanced Technology in Big Data and Health Sciences.
The business raised $1.5m in a 2016 seed round backed by undisclosed investors, before securing $1.1m from the Start-Up NY economic development initiative in February 2017 through its affiliation with Buffalo.