Histogenics Brings In $49M for Tissue Regeneration—and Recapitalization

This is one of the bigger venture deals of the year for Boston.

Histogenics, a regenerative medicine company based in Waltham, MA, has closed $49 million in new financing led by Sofinnova Ventures. New investors Split Rock Partners, BioMed Ventures, and FinTech GIMV Fund also participated in the round, along with previous investors ProChon Holdings, Altima Partners, Foundation Medical Partners, Inflection Point Capital, and Boston Millennia Partners.

The deal is being called a Series A financing round for the company. According to our records, however, Histogenics has raised more than $40 million in equity and debt funding since 2008. The company started back in 2000 and acquired ProChon BioTech in a stock deal last year. Today’s financing is a traditional recapitalization, not a restart, according to a company spokesperson. The company declined to comment on how much it had raised prior to the new round.

Histogenics is in the middle of clinical trials for its lead product candidate, called NeoCart. This is a tissue implant that uses a patient’s own cells to grow cartilage outside the body for the purpose of repairing cartilage lesions in the knee. The company has another product candidate, called VeriCart, that uses a tissue-engineering approach involving stem cells and a collagen scaffold to repair cartilage defects. That product is slated for the European market, pending regulatory clearance.

The company is led by CEO Patrick O’Donnell, who came over in the ProChon acquisition last year.

Author: Gregory T. Huang

Greg is a veteran journalist who has covered a wide range of science, technology, and business. As former editor in chief, he overaw daily news, features, and events across Xconomy's national network. Before joining Xconomy, he was a features editor at New Scientist magazine, where he edited and wrote articles on physics, technology, and neuroscience. Previously he was senior writer at Technology Review, where he reported on emerging technologies, R&D, and advances in computing, robotics, and applied physics. His writing has also appeared in Wired, Nature, and The Atlantic Monthly’s website. He was named a New York Times professional fellow in 2003. Greg is the co-author of Guanxi (Simon & Schuster, 2006), about Microsoft in China and the global competition for talent and technology. Before becoming a journalist, he did research at MIT’s Artificial Intelligence Lab. He has published 20 papers in scientific journals and conferences and spoken on innovation at Adobe, Amazon, eBay, Google, HP, Microsoft, Yahoo, and other organizations. He has a Master’s and Ph.D. in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT, and a B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.