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Immunotherapy Developer Gains $4.9M in Series B Funds

Loose bills of multiple denominations (borman818)Gliknik Inc., a biopharmaceutical company in Baltimore, raised $4.9 million in series B funds, the second series of financing after initial start-up. Baxter Ventures led the funding round, joined by the company’s existing investors.

Gliknik is a developer of therapies for patients with cancer and immune disorders that use the power of the immune system to fight disease. Its technology platform, called Stradomer, creates engineered compounds for autoimmune disease therapies. Autoimmune diseases are those where the immune system attacks healthy cells in the body by mistake; examples are multiple sclerosis and myasthenia gravis, a neuromuscular disorder.

One of Gliknik’s compounds in development is GL-2045, a protein designed to mimic the efficacy and safety of intravenous immunoglobulin in patients with autoimmune diseases. Intravenous immunoglobulin is used to treat a number of immune disorders, and is usually produced from human plasma. Gliknik expects to test GL-2045 as a treatment for myasthenia gravis, and later with other neurological conditions.

The company plans to apply the new investment to further develop GL-2045, says Gliknik’s chief scientist Norbert Riedel, and determine if other engineered peptides can complement intravenous immunoglobulin therapies based on plasma. Gliknik also expects to use the funds to advance its clinical immune-system booster compounds currently in clinical trials with patients with advanced cancers, including multiple myeloma and head and neck cancers.

Baxter Ventures that leads the funding round invests in companies that complement its current medical products an bioscience business lines. Gliknik’s other current investors, identified on its Web site, are LifeTech Development Partners and Maryland Health Care Product Development Corporation.

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Photo: borman818/Flickr

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