Faust Pharma closes 8.2M euro financing

Strasbourg, France-headquartered Faust Pharmaceuticals, a clinical-stage product company specializing in the discovery and development of drugs for diseases of the nervous system, says it has closed an 8.2 million-euro ($10.5 million) insider bridge financing. Participating were existing institutional investors Sofinnova Partners, Auriga Partners, Siparex Ventures, Edmond de Rothschild Investment Partners, AGF Private Equity, CDC Entreprises - Fonds de Co-investissement des Jeunes Entreprises.

Faust Pharmaceuticals intends this bridge financing to be the first tranche of a proposed 25.0-35.0 million-euro M C round financing for the following purposes:

- Phase IIb development of its lead compound, FP0011, a small molecule glutamate inhibitor initially targeting Parkinson's disease; - development of FP0023, a small molecule fetal gene activating utrophin inducer scheduled to enter the clinic early next year for Duchenne muscular dystrophy; - development of FP1770, a small molecule mGluR 4/8 group III selective agonist scheduled to enter regulatory pre-clinical development early next year for Parkinson's disease; - in-licensing of additional clinical stage compounds; and - development of the company's Neuroclid GPCR drug discovery platform for selectively identifying allosteric modulators and "de-orphanizing" GPCRs.