Excited to announce our investment in the seed for Transcera, a biotech company developing a ceramide lipid-based drug delivery platform that utilizes active transport pathways to increase drug absorption. We are joined by Xora Innovation, an early-stage deep tech investment platform of Temasek, Digitalis Ventures, Pear VC, and KdT Ventures. Tau Ventures is an AI-first fund in Silicon Valley investing primarily in mature seed, typically when there is a pipeline of customers. We found Transcera to be exciting for several reasons: (1) big need (2) high-caliber team and (3) product opportunity.
1) The Need
A key factor in dosing for biologic drugs used for prevalent chronic disease such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease is tension between the drugs’ bioavailability and toxicity, leading to the importance of developing drug delivery vehicles for increased absorption in the reticuloendothelial system. Transcera promises a completely new way of increasing absorption compared to the traditional methods of permeation enhancers, which target passive transport pathways. Through Dr. Wayne Lencer’s life-time research on sphingolipid-based drug delivery, the tech leverages a conjugation platform to tow drugs through the epithelial mucosa for enhanced absorption.
Surveys show that 40% of current drugs on market have poor bioavailability, which presents a huge market for Transcera to enter.
2) The Team
Transcera’s team brings high level of therapeutic technical expertise in its leadership:
- Hunter Goble – cofounder / CEO, HBS Blavatnik (prestigious life sciences fellowship) with 6 years at Eli Lilly
- Justin Wolfe – cofounder / CSO, MIT PhD
- Wayne Lencer – cofounder / inventor, Harvard Professor with 30+ years in the field, where the tech comes from
3) The Product
Several strategies have been explored to enhance oral bioavailability, such as the use of permeation enhancers, enzyme inhibitors, carrier systems, and formulation technologies. These approaches aim to protect peptides from degradation and improve their absorption, thereby increasing their effectiveness as oral therapeutics. Transcera offers increased oral bioavailability through its ceramide-based drug delivery vehicle that utilizes active transport pathways to increase drug absorption. The company is exploring GLP-1 and GLP-2 drugs as its first products. GLP-1s present a huge market opportunity as they are traditionally used to treat diabetes and have also seen an uptick in weight loss trends recently due to purportedly lack of severe side effects and immediate weight loss effects. Other future targets are drugs in the thyroid, cardiovascular disease, and CNS disease space.
Primary author of this article is Sharon Huang, in collaboration with Amit Garg. Originally published on “Data Driven Investor,” am happy to syndicate on other platforms. Amit is a Managing Partner and Cofounder of Tau Ventures with 20 years in Silicon Valley across corporates, own startup, and VC funds. These are purposely short articles focused on practical insights (I call it gl;dr — good length; did read). Many of my writings are at https://www.linkedin.com/in/amgarg/detail/recent-activity/posts and I would be stoked if they get people interested enough in a topic to explore in further depth. If this article had useful insights for you, comment away and/or give a like on the article and on the Tau Ventures’ LinkedIn page, with due thanks for supporting our work. All opinions expressed here are my own.
