Metagenomi Closes Oversubscribed Series B Financing Totaling $275M to Advance Lead Therapeutic Programs into Clinical Development and Grow Genetic Medicines Pipeline

Metageno­mi, a genet­ic med­i­cines com­pa­ny with a ver­sa­tile port­fo­lio of whol­ly owned, next-gen­er­a­tion gene edit­ing sys­tems, today announced the close of a Series B exten­sion financ­ing, co-led by Novo Hold­ings A/​S, Catalio Cap­i­tal Man­age­ment and Sym­Bio­sis, with par­tic­i­pa­tion from new and exist­ing investors. This $100M financ­ing brings the total Series B pro­ceeds to $275M, with over 30 invest­ment groups par­tic­i­pat­ing. In con­nec­tion with the financ­ing, Ray Cama­hort, Ph.D., Part­ner at Novo Ven­tures, will join Metagenomi’s board as an observer.

“At Novo Hold­ings, our pur­pose is to improve people’s health and the sus­tain­abil­i­ty of soci­ety and the plan­et. Metageno­mi con­tin­ues to dis­play an impres­sive track record of rapid­ly devel­op­ing nov­el gene edit­ing sys­tems and advanc­ing them through pre­clin­i­cal val­i­da­tion,” said Ray Cama­hort Ph.D., Part­ner at Novo Ven­tures. ​“With the com­bi­na­tion of Metagenomi’s next-gen­er­a­tion tech­nol­o­gy plat­form, pre­clin­i­cal progress, numer­ous val­i­dat­ing part­ner­ships and strong investors, we believe the Com­pa­ny is well posi­tioned to rapid­ly devel­op ther­a­peu­tics to treat a broad range of genet­ic diseases.”

With a healthy cash run­way off the heels of suc­cess­ful part­ner­ships with Mod­er­na and Ion­is Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, this addi­tion­al cap­i­tal will enable Metageno­mi to advance its lead ther­a­peu­tic pro­grams through pre­clin­i­cal devel­op­ment and into clin­i­cal proof-of-con­cept. Fur­ther­more, the Com­pa­ny plans to nom­i­nate addi­tion­al ther­a­peu­tic tar­gets to its pro­pri­etary genet­ic med­i­cines pipeline, fueled by its auto­mat­ed dis­cov­ery engine and ver­sa­tile gene edit­ing tool­box, to expand into addi­tion­al pre­clin­i­cal proof-of-con­cept studies.

“The clos­ing of this Series B exten­sion financ­ing is a tes­ta­ment to our sig­nif­i­cant progress over the past year. We fur­ther expand­ed our tool­box of whol­ly owned, next-gen­er­a­tion gene edit­ing tech­nolo­gies, embarked on our first non­hu­man pri­mate (NHP) in vivo gene edit­ing proof-of-con­cept stud­ies and strength­ened our strate­gic busi­ness devel­op­ment alliances,” said Bri­an C. Thomas, CEO and Founder of Metageno­mi. ​“This addi­tion­al cap­i­tal gives us vis­i­bil­i­ty on ini­tial clin­i­cal mile­stones as well as an expand­ed pipeline of in vivo gene edit­ing applications.”

About Metageno­mi

Metageno­mi is a gene edit­ing com­pa­ny com­mit­ted to devel­op­ing poten­tial­ly cura­tive ther­a­peu­tics by lever­ag­ing a pro­pri­etary tool­box of next-gen­er­a­tion gene edit­ing sys­tems to accu­rate­ly edit DNA where cur­rent tech­nolo­gies can­not. Our metage­nomics-pow­ered dis­cov­ery plat­form and ana­lyt­i­cal exper­tise reveal nov­el cel­lu­lar machin­ery sourced from oth­er­wise unknown organ­isms. We adapt and forge these nat­u­ral­ly evolved sys­tems into pow­er­ful gene edit­ing sys­tems that are ultra-small, extreme­ly effi­cient, high­ly spe­cif­ic and have a decreased risk of immune response. These sys­tems fuel our pipeline of nov­el med­i­cines and can be lever­aged by part­ners. Our goal is to rev­o­lu­tion­ize gene edit­ing for the ben­e­fit of patients around the world. For more infor­ma­tion, please vis­it https://​metageno​mi​.co.

About Novo Holdings

Novo Hold­ings is a hold­ing and invest­ment com­pa­ny that is respon­si­ble for man­ag­ing the assets of the Novo Nordisk Foun­da­tion, one of the world’s largest enter­prise foun­da­tions. The pur­pose of Novo Hold­ings is to improve people’s health and the sus­tain­abil­i­ty of soci­ety and the plan­et by gen­er­at­ing attrac­tive long-term returns on the assets of the Novo Nordisk Foundation.

Whol­ly owned by the Novo Nordisk Foun­da­tion, Novo Hold­ings is the con­trol­ling share­hold­er of Novo Nordisk and Novozymes (the Novo Group com­pa­nies) and man­ages an invest­ment port­fo­lio, with a long-term return per­spec­tive. Novo Hold­ings invests in life sci­ence com­pa­nies of all stages of devel­op­ment and also man­ages a broad port­fo­lio of equi­ties, bonds, real estate and infra­struc­ture assets as well as pri­vate equi­ty invest­ments. As of year-end 2021, Novo Hold­ings had total assets of USD 106 billion.

Fur­ther infor­ma­tion: www​.novo​hold​ings​.dk

About Catalio Cap­i­tal Management

Catalio Cap­i­tal Man­age­ment, LP, is a mul­ti-strat­e­gy life sci­ences invest­ment firm that focus­es on break­through bio­med­ical tech­nol­o­gy com­pa­nies devel­op­ing the next gen­er­a­tion of drugs, devices, diag­nos­tics, and data-dri­ven insights. The firm cur­rent­ly man­ages over $1 bil­lion assets across its pri­vate equi­ty, pri­vate cred­it, and pub­lic equi­ties strate­gies. Catal­io’s Part­ner­ship includes over 39 world-renowned sci­en­tists with exten­sive aca­d­e­m­ic and sci­en­tif­ic achieve­ments who have each start­ed well-estab­lished com­pa­nies based on their research. Catalio has offices in New York, Bal­ti­more, and London.

About Sym­Bio­sis

Sym­Bio­sis is an invest­ment firm focused on advanc­ing bio­ther­a­peu­tics inno­va­tions for seri­ous and life-threat­en­ing dis­eases. The firm invests in ground­break­ing med­i­cines across dis­ease areas, financ­ing stage, and geog­ra­phy, with a focus on pro­grams in, or about to enter, human tri­als. Sym­Bio­sis cur­rent­ly man­ages a port­fo­lio of more than 30 invest­ments and has sig­nif­i­cant, long-term cap­i­tal com­mit­ments to fund future invest­ments. For more infor­ma­tion, please vis­it www​.sym​bio​sis​.vc