Octave Raises $11M in Series A Funding

Octave, a national behavioral health practice, raised $11M in Series A funding.

The round was led by Greycroft, with participation from Obvious Ventures.

The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand nationally, with additional locations planned for California and New York next year.

Led by founder and CEO, Sandeep Acharya, Octave is a new evidence-based therapy practice and wellness community offering in-person and virtual coaching, group therapy and psychiatry, along with an array of content and assessment tools to support clients between sessions. Since opening its first office in New York in October 2018, the company has launched a number of new services, including group sessions for anxiety, LGBTQ patients, and expecting couples, and has also expanded virtual coaching nationwide, serving patients in multiple states and even internationally.

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Sponsor 

myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.

To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.

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The company plans to increase staff therapists in the coming months and will also begin offering a variety of free classes for Octave members – from meditation to one-night workshops.

Octave opens its first San Francisco location at 625 Market Street on October 28, with its second New York office opening in the Flatiron Building in December. The company also announced a partnership with Anthem Blue Cross of California to serve patients as an in-network provider.

Acharya is joined by Chief Clinical Officer Dr. Sarah Adler and head of operations Sejal Shah.

Source. FinSMEs, October 22, 2019

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Amphivena raises $62M Series C round to develop bispecific antibody in solid tumors

A company developing a bispecific antibody that already has clinical data in blood cancers has raised more than $60 million in its latest venture capital funding round that it plans to use to advance the drug in solid tumors.

South San Francisco, California-based Amphivena Therapeutics said Tuesday that it had raised $62 million in a Series C round, which NanoDimension and Qiming Venture Partners co-led. New investors included Clough Capital, Aju IB, Korys Merieux, Kaitai Capital, Industrial Investors and Nawton Limited, along with insider investors MPM Capital and funds managed by Tekla Capital Management and Franklin Berger.

The company is developing a bispecific T-cell engager antibody called AMV564, which targets CD33 and CD3. Such antibodies are immunotherapies designed to work by targeting both cancer cell-surface proteins and proteins expressed on the surfaces of T cells, enabling the latter to kill the former. The company has been developing the drug for acute myeloid leukemia and myelodysplastic syndromes, and it is currently in a Phase I study among relapsed or refractory AML.

The drug is designed to eliminate myeloid-derived suppressor cells, or MDSCs, while sparing normal neutrophils and monocytes. In addition to MDS and AML, the drug is in a Phase I study for solid tumors that the company said is open for enrollment, though searches for the name of the company of the drug on ClinicalTrials.gov only turned up the MDS and AML trials.

Updated data from the AML study presented at the European Hematology Association’s 2019 annual meeting in July from 33 patients across nine dose cohorts showed a complete response, a complete response with incomplete hematological recovery and a partial response. Grade 1 and 2 cytokine release syndrome – a side effect sometimes observed with bispecific antibodies – also occurred.

Amgen’s Blincyto (blinatumomab) is a bispecific T-cell engager currently on the market. The drug targets the CD19 antigen in acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Amgen is developing another bispecific antibody, AMG 420, that targets the BCMA antigen in multiple myeloma and produced a 70 percent overall response rate among patients who received the drug at 400 micrograms, the dose recommended for further study. Another bispecific antibody on the market is Roche’s Hemlibra (emicizumab-kxwh), used to treat hemophilia A.

In late June, the Food and Drug Administration issued a draft guidance for companies developing bispecific antibodies, in oncology as well as other disease areas. However, an expert said the guidance was flawed because it did not distinguish between Blincyto and Hemlibra’s very different mechanisms of action, despite both products falling under the category of “bispecific.”

Source. Medcity News, September, 24, 2019,  Alaric Dearment

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Complete Solar Raises $9M in Funding

Complete Solar, a San Ramon, CA-based solar tech company, raised $9M in equity funding.

The round was led by Ecosystem Integrity Fund with participation from the Libra Foundation.

The company intends to use the funds to expand:

– its market reach, which includes enabling non-solar sales channels to grow their respective product offerings through its reseller program amd

– its product offerings to include electric car chargers, battery back-up systems, electric heat pumps, roofing, and other home energy upgrades by cross promoting its partners’ energy products.

Led by CEO Will Anderson, Complete Solar provides a platform offering sales tools and diverse financing options to companies looking to offer solar energy systems to homeowners. Since 2016, the company has partnered with over 100 companies across California, New Jersey, Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, Utah and Arizona, which specialize in solar sales as well as established companies in adjacent fields, such as HVAC companies, roofing companies, and new home builders.

Source. FinSMEs, September, 23, 2019

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This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.

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