Cardio3 raises €19m in new funding round

The fresh capital will allow Cardio3 to further finance the ongoing Phase III trial of its lead product, C-Cure, which is currently being tested in Europe on patients with congestive heart failure.

Details of which firms participated in the new funding round have not been disclosed. Previous investors in the company include Hunza Ventures via its Hunza Ventures II fund, Life Sciences Research Partners via its Sofia BVBA vehicle, Tolefi, Umbrella Investments, Avion and the Regional Investment Company of Wallona (SRIW).

Hunza and Life Sciences invested in Cardio3 in January 2009. The series-B round raised €7.2m in equity and also saw new backing from Grifols, a Spanish healthcare company. Prior to this, Cardio3 reportedly raised €6.4m through private investors, SRIW and research grants.

Private investors collectively own a 45% stake in the company, while Cardio3's founders hold 18% and its management and employees own 12%. Minnesota-based research hospital Mayo Clinic holds the remaining 25%.

Company
Cardio3 Biosciences was founded in 2004 under the name Cardio3 and is headquartered in Mont-Saint-Guibert in Belgium. In 2007, the company was renamed as Cardio3 Biosciences.

Cardio3 develops regenerative and protective therapies for the treatment of cardiovascular diseases. The therapies are designed to protect the muscular tissue of the heart from injury, reconstruct damaged heart tissue and reduce the volume of scar tissue.

Its lead product, C-Cure, is a form of stem cell therapy designed to address heart failure. The aim of the product is to reprogramme a patient's own bone marrow cells into cardiopoietic cells in a process called cardiopoiesis. The new cardiac progenitor cells behave like the cells lost to heart disease and could therefore repair damaged muscular heart tissue. The cardiopoietic cells are injected into the heart through a C-Cath, an injection catheter developed by Cardio3.

People
Chairman Michel Lussier and non-executive director William Wijns are co-founders of Cardio3, while Christian Homsy is the company's CEO.

Tolefi managing director Serge Goblet sits on the pharmaceutical company's board alongside Chris Buyse, who represents Life Sciences Research Partners on Cardio3's board as an independent director.

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• Topics
• Early-stage
• Healthcare
• Benelux
• Belgium