BPI France et al. fund new French biotech

BPI France, which led the funding round, backed the company via the €139m Innobio fund. Innobio closed in October 2009 and typically makes venture capital investments in the French technology and healthcare spaces.

GamaMabs was launched by LFB in partnership with the investor consortium's funding, but will operate as a standalone company. However, the new biotech will benefit from a number of the LFB group's operational facilities. The company has gained an exclusive global sub-licence from the pharma giant and is supported by its EMABling platform. In exchange for allowing GamaMabs to access these benefits, LFB has taken a minority stake in the business.

The investment by the consortium will allow GamaMabs to prepare its first clinical trial.

Paris-headquartered LFB claims to be the fifth largest company operating in the field of plasma-derived medicinal products. The company develops medication for rare and serious pathologies in the hemostasis, immunology and intensive care fields. LFB, which employs slightly less than 1,890 staff, generated turnover of €465.7m in 2012.

The Irdinov fund is a 2012-vintage, state-backed inter-regional seed fund. The fund is managed by BPI France and the Regional Institute for Industrial Development of Midi-Pyrénées (Irdi), alongside the Midi-Pyrénées and Aquitaine regional governments. The vehicle invests €500,000-3m in start-ups, with a particular focus on backing spinouts from research organisations in the industrial sector. Irdinov invests only in companies located in the Aquitaine, Midi-Pyrénées and Limousin regions.

Company
GamaMabs will initially specialise in the treatment of ovarian cancer - the biotech plans to develop a new therapeutic antibody that targets gynaecological cancers. LFB awarded GamaMabs with a global sub-licence for the antibody 3C23K, which the company claims has proven its effectiveness in experimental models of ovarian cancer. The antibody has strong cytotoxic activity, according to GamaMabs, and was chosen by LFB from its EMABling platform, described as a "proprietary platform for the monoclonal antibody generations".

GamaMabs' founders hope to launch clinical trials for the product by 2015.

People
GamaMabs was launched by Dr Jean-François Prost and Stéphane Degove. Prost, who will act as GamaMabs' vice president of research and development and strategy, was previously the scientific and medical director of LFB, a role he held for 10 years. GamaMabs CEO Degove was the co-founder of thrombosis and cancer specialist Endotis Pharma.

Philippe Boucheron is the deputy director of life sciences at BPI France. Denis Soubeyran is the head of finance and strategy at LFB, while Christian Béchon is the pharma company's president.

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