Gene therapy newco Genenta raises EUR 6.2M toward series A

Gene therapy newco Genenta Science s.r.l. (Milan, Italy) raised EUR 6.2 million ($7.2 million) in a series A round from undisclosed private investors including individuals, entrepreneurs, managers and family offices. Chairman and CEO Pierluigi Paracchi told BioCentury the company expects to close the round at EUR 10 million ($11.6 million) within a month.

Paracchi said the company's key IP is an miRNA-based method of regulating interferon-alpha expression that was developed at San Raffaele Hospital in the lab of Luigi Naldini, the chairman of Genenta's scientific advisory board. Genenta uses lentiviral vectors to transfer the IFN-alpha gene into autologous hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). The gene is then selectively turned on only in tumor-infiltrating monocytes and macrophages. ...