Quark Pharma: Lands $27M, Expands Clinical Programs

Back in February CLSDF highlighted Quark Pharmaceuticals as another private company headquartered outside of Colorado yet with a major presence in Colorado. The company announced the close of a $27M financing led by SBI Asset Management which may enable drug candidates in five clinical programs by 2H08. As a result of the financing clinical operations in the Boulder office is expected to ramp. It already appears as though hiring in the office is underway (here) with more expected. Great news for Quark, for Boulder and for the continued advancement of siRNA technologies.

If anyone from Quark is reading this be certain to post your openings on the BioBeers job board (http://BioBeers.com)

Quark has a robust product portfolio including two clinical, one pre-IND and six pre-clinical candidates in development. Its lead product candidates are RTP801i-14, an siRNA molecule in Phase I/IIa clinical trial for the treatment of wet age-related macular degeneration that is licensed to Pfizer on an exclusive worldwide basis. AKIi-5, a Phase I, siRNA molecule for the prevention of acute kidney injury and acute renal failure following major cardiac surgery, and AHLi-11, a pre-IND siRNA molecule for the prevention of chemotherapy and noise-induced hearing loss.

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Quark + Boulder = siRNA Clinical Candidates

Thank you for the emails re: last weeks post on Juvaris BioTherapeutics. This week I am continuing the theme of highlighting more of the private companies who though not headquartered in Colorado have a meaningful presence. One such company is Quark Pharmaceuticals who though headquartered in Freemont, CA maintains their development unit Boulder.

Quark Pharmaceuticals is a development-stage pharmaceutical company engaged in discovering and developing novel therapeutic RNAi drug candidates. Quark has a fully integrated drug development platform that spans therapeutic target identification to drug development and includes:

• A proprietary gene discovery platform (BiFAR™) and algorithm for optimizing siRNA design
• Novel siRNA structures and chemistry that Quark believes provide freedom to operate in the crowded siRNA intellectual property arena for its future product pipeline
• The ability to deliver siRNA locally and systemically to organs including eye, ear, kidney, lung, spinal cord and bone marrow
  

Quark has a robust product portfolio including two clinical, one pre-IND and six preclinical candidates in development. Its lead product candidates are RTP801i-14, an siRNA molecule in Phase I/IIa clinical trial for the treatment of wet age-related macular degeneration that is licensed to Pfizer on an exclusive worldwide basis. AKIi-5 is a Phase I, siRNA molecule, delivered systemically, for the prevention of acute kidney injury / acute renal failure following major cardiac surgery, and AHLi-11, a pre-IND siRNA molecule for the prevention of chemotherapy and noise-induced hearing loss.

***NOTE*** Read the new eBook CLSDF 2007 - What's In A Year? (HERE)!

If you enjoyed this post get free email or RSS updates (here).