NEW YORK – San Francisco-based Olema Oncology said on Wednesday that it closed a $54 million Series B financing round, co-led by BVF Partners, Logos Capital, and Janus Henderson Investors.
New investors also participated in this round, including Cormorant Asset Management, RA Capital Management, Wellington Management Company, Surveyor Capital, Venrock Healthcare Capital Partners, and Foresite Capital.
Olema will use the funds to advance its lead drug candidate OP-1250 into a Phase I/II clinical trial, which it expects to initiate in the second half of 2020, and expand ongoing research and development at the company.
The upcoming Phase I/II dose-escalation and expansion trial will first evaluate OP-1250 as a monotherapy in estrogen receptor-positive, HER2-negative, advanced or metastatic breast cancer. It will also aim to study OP-1250 in combination with other targeted breast cancer therapies.
OP-1250 is a complete estrogen receptor antagonist, which was able to shrink ER-positive breast tumors in preclinical xenograft models.
"With our deep insight into the biology of breast cancer, including target engagement, receptor binding and intracellular signaling, we have carefully selected OP-1250 as our lead program and are advancing it into human studies. Our goal is to develop more effective medicines to treat estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer," Olema CEO Cyrus Harmon said in a statement.