• Novo Seeds co-leads a EUR 37m Series A financing of Belgian Camel-IDS

• Funding will be used for a phase Ib/II trial of the lead program CAM-H2, targeting HER2-positive brain metastatic breast cancer

Copenhagen, Denmark, 15 November 2018 – Novo Seeds, the early stage investment arm of Novo Holdings, today announced an investment in Camel-IDS, a VUB spin-off company in Belgium developing cancer-targeted radiopharmaceuticals. The investment is a part of a EUR 37m series A financing round.

“We are impressed by the CAMEL-IDS team and the pipeline of cancer-targeted radiopharmaceuticals based on single domain antibody fragments. We believe that this unique modality could bring significant value to patients suffering from a range of difficult to treat cancers. We look forward to working with the management team and fellow investors to bring these therapies to patients,” says Morten Graugaard Døssing, Principal at Novo Seeds.

The proceeds will enable Camel-IDS to run a phase Ib/II trial with its lead program CAM-H2 targeting HER2-positive brain metastatic breast cancer, while further progressing and broadening its preclinical pipeline.

“The successful financing underscores the potential of our innovative technology and product pipeline. We are grateful for the continued support from our existing shareholders and look forward to welcoming the new international investor syndicate that has extensive experience in leveraging platform technologies to develop multi-product opportunities,” says Ruth Devenyns, CEO of Camel-IDS.

Today, breast cancer patients with tumors that overexpress HER2, a growth-promoting protein, can benefit from effective targeted treatments, yet have a poor prognosis when the cancer progresses towards the brain. Camel-IDS’ lead program CAM-H2 aims to effectively irradiate brain lesions while sparing healthy tissue, based on its unique technology platform that leverages the favorable tissue distribution of camelid derived single domain antibodies linked to radionuclides. The company’s technology platform also allows for a theranostic approach, where patients can be selected using a low dose/imaging version of the product, followed by a high therapeutic dose for treatment.

While leading the recent Series A financing of Syndesi Therapeutics in Belgium, Novo Seeds interacted with the area’s biotech ecosystem and investors and became aware of the efforts being made to transform Camel-IDS from a promising academic spin-out to a well-funded biotech with several programs.

“We look forward to continue developing the strategy for the company in utilizing single domain antibody fragment based radiopharmaceuticals for the treatment of cancers with high unmet medical needs,” says Morten Graugaard Døssing, adding:

”Recent acquisitions in the area of radiopharmaceuticals indicate the area’s significant potential and we look forward to help further realize the potential of CAMEL-IDS together our fellow investors.”

Other investors include V-Bio Ventures (Belgium), Gimv (Belgium), HealthCap (Sweden), Pontifax (Israel) and BioMedPartners (Switzerland). Existing investors also participated.

About Camel-IDS

Camel-IDS (www.camel-ids.com), incorporated in 2014 as a spin-off company of Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), develops novel radiopharmaceuticals, using camelid single domain antibody fragments (sdAb) labeled with radioisotopes. The company’s lead product CAM-H2, a new treatment option in HER2-positive cancers, is in early clinical development. The pipeline further consists of two pre-clinical programs leveraging the technology strengths. Camel-IDS has received seed funding from the Fournier-Majoie Foundation and three seed investors, complemented with non-dilutive funding from Innoviris.