Voyaging into gene therapy

Third Rock says advances in the design and delivery of adeno-associated viral vectors makes it the right time to invest in gene therapies. The firm launched Voyager Therapeutics Inc. last week with a $45 million series A round to advance AAV-based gene therapies to treat Parkinson's disease (PD), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and Friedreich's ataxia.

Voyager has a platform for engineering, optimizing and manufacturing AAV vectors and also is developing optimized dosing and delivery protocols for its therapeutic candidates...