Novartis and Versant co-lead Anokion series-A

Novo Ventures, a subsidiary of private limited liability company Novo, also participated in the round, as did a number of other private investors.

The funds raised will be used to develop clinical candidates in the areas of immune-masked protein therapeutics, and autoimmune and allergic diseases, with clinical trials planned for 2017.

The deal marks Versant's fourth investment of Q2 2014, having previously injected growth capital into Basel-based Piqur, a pharmaceutical company focusing on cancer treatment, and biopharmaceutical company Crispr Therapeutics, a biotech focusing on gene-editing technology. Versant also took part in the funding round for Paris-based AAV Life, a gene-therapy company focusing on rare diseases.

Company
Headquartered in Lausanne, Anokion is a spinout from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and has developed a technology for retraining white blood cells to induce therapeutic immune tolerance. The technology uses the body's natural immune regulation by engineering proteins to be perceived as "self" entities and therefore treat autoimmune and allergic diseases. As a platform, Anokion's approach can be translated to other proteins in clinical indications. The company was founded in late 2012 and currently has four full-time employees.

People
Jeff Hubbell is the academic founder of Anokion. Florent Gros is managing director at Novartis and Tom Woiwode is managing director at Versant, both of whom join the Anokion board of directors.

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