Thymmune Therapeutics, a biotechnology company based in Cambridge, MA, has secured $7 million in seed financing to develop its scalable thymic cell therapies. The company aims to use its technology to restore immune function in aging and disease. The funding round was led by Pillar VC, with participation from NYBC Ventures and other investors, including industry pioneers such as Mark Bamforth, James Fordyce, John Maraganore, Judy Pagliuca, Philip Reilly, and scientific advisor George Church, Ph.D.
Thymmune plans to use the funds to advance its lead product, THY-100, into preclinical studies for immune system disorders caused by thymic deficiencies, such as children born without a thymus. The company also intends to expand into additional indications across areas of unmet clinical need in immunology and develop its thymic cell engineering platform.
Led by Founder and CEO Stan Wang, M.D., Ph.D., Thymmune is developing a machine learning-enabled thymic cell engineering platform that can generate off-the-shelf cells at scale. The company’s pipeline of therapies includes treatments for immunodeficiencies, transplant-related, and autoimmune diseases.
The thymus is a crucial organ in the immune system that regulates and develops T cells, which are essential for fighting infection and disease and mounting effective responses to vaccines. However, as part of the natural aging process, the functional thymus begins to shrink, and its ability to produce naïve T cells decreases, leading to immune dysfunction and disease. Thymmune’s innovative approach to developing thymic cell therapies has the potential to address a significant unmet need in the field of immunology.
