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Biotech Tests Pig-to-Human Transplants With New Funds

Biotech Raises $100 Million to Test Pig to Human Transplants

(Bloomberg) -- EGenesis, a biotech company working to alleviate the shortage of organs available for transplants, raised $100 million in new funding for its program that genetically edits organs from pigs so that they can be safely used in humans.

The investment, led by Fresenius Medical Care Ventures, brings funding for eGenesis to $138 million, with participation from new investors including Bayer AG’s investment arm, Leaps by Bayer, and Wellington Partners. Existing investors also participated including Arch Venture Partners and billionaire venture capitalist Vinod Khosla’s Khosla Ventures.

Biotech Tests Pig-to-Human Transplants With New Funds

The Cambridge, Mass.-based company plans to tackle the organ donation crisis by using Crispr, a type of genetic scissors that allows scientists to remove or replace precise sections of DNA, and other gene-editing technologies to alter pig organs so they can be used in life-saving transplants for humans in need of new kidneys.

It’s not a new idea, but concerns about pig viruses infecting humans have stymied research for decades. EGenesis has been able to raise pigs without porcine endogenous retrovirus, or PERV, said Paul Sekhri, the startup’s president and chief executive officer. The financing will help eGenesis begin human testing of the organs, which could happen in the next few years, he said. Some of proceeds will be used to support novel programs to replace insulin-producing islet cells and for liver, heart and lung transplants.

“It’s not a question of if it will work, but how and when?” Sekhri said in a phone interview. The company is targeting kidney transplants first for safety reasons, since the kidney can be removed and the patient put back on dialysis if the approach fails.

The cost of dialysis and kidney transplants became a focus of the Trump administration this summer when the U.S. president proposed plans to overhaul Medicare payments for kidney disease. EGenesis isn’t alone in its efforts. United Therapeutics Corp. has also been working in the field. Sekhri sees the closely-held biotech as being in the lead, although the enormous unmet need for transplants could translate to a large global market. Roughly 20 people die a day in the U.S. due to the shortage of donors.

“EGenesis is poised to revolutionize the entire organ transplantation market, which could save lives in a way that was previously not thought possible just a few years ago,” Juergen Eckhardt, head of Leaps by Bayer, said in an email. “We now have the tools at our disposal to address the historical hurdles that have challenged the field.”

Eckhardt will join the eGenesis board, along with his colleague Lucio Iannone and Al Wiegman, head of ventures at Fresenius Medical Care Ventures.

To contact the reporter on this story: Cristin Flanagan in New York at cflanagan1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Michelle Fay Cortez, Jennifer Bissell-Linsk

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