JADO secures 3.9M-euro financing

Dresden, Germany-based JADO Technologies GmbH, a developer of RAFT intervention therapeutics, says it has raised 3.9 million euros ($5.0 million) in a series B financing led by PEPPERMINT.Financial Partners. New investor NRW.BANK and existing ones Dresden Fonds GmbH, EMBL Ventures, KfW, Max Planck Society and MASA Life Science Ventures also participated in the round.

The proceeds will be used to advance two formulations of the firm's lead clinical-stage compound, TF002, through the rest of Phase II trials in both atopic dermatitis and urticaria. Furthermore, the funds will be utilized to advance second-generation allergy compounds to proof-of-principle in animal in asthma.

Concurrent with the financing, JADO has established an in-silico laboratory at the Department of Life Science Informatics, University of Bonn. This will develop an algorithm-based filtering tool to screen compound libraries for new scaffolds with RAFT modulator activity. In-silico tools offer several advantages over classical approaches in identifying new scaffolds and options for intellectual property, including speed, efficiency and hit-rate. JADO believes this approach will generate ovel New Chemical Entity classes and drug candidates during 2009.