Elevation Pharmaceuticals Raises $30M to Develop Aerosol Treatments for Pulmonary Diseases

San Diego-based Elevation Pharmaceuticals, a biotech startup developing aerosol-based treatments for respiratory diseases, said today it has raised a tranched $30 million in Series A venture funding. It’s a sizable round for the local life sciences community, but other recent fundings have come close. Last month, VentiRx raised $25 million, Pfenex got $24 million, and Zogenix got $20 million.

Elevation was co-founded in 2008 by Cam Garner, a San Diego serial entrepreneur who serves as Elevation board chairman; CEO Bill Gerhart, the former chief executive of Mpex Pharmaceuticals; and Ahmet Tutuncu, a former vice president of medical affairs at Verus Pharmaceuticals. Garner was previously a founder at San Diego specialty pharmaceutical companies Somaxon Pharmaceuticals, Zogenix, Evoke Pharma, Meritage Pharma, DJ Pharma, and Xcel Pharmaceuticals. He was also the chairman and CEO of San Diego’s Dura Pharmaceuticals, which was acquired by Elan in late 2000.

The capital will carry development of Elevation’s first candidate through mid-stage clinical trials and enable the biotech to begin development of a pipeline of product candidates targeted at underserved patient subpopulations with respiratory disease, Gerhart said in a statement.

Elevation’s lead drug candidate, EP-101, is a long-acting molecule that opens constricted bronchial tubes in the lungs. It is intended for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a progressive disease chiefly caused by smoking. Despite anti-smoking campaigns, COPD is the fastest growing major disease in the U.S. and around the world. It is currently the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S.

The company has partnered with PARI Pharma, a device maker based near Munich, Germany, that specializes in aerosol delivery devices and drug products. Elevation and PARI are working to deliver Elevation’s EP-101 using PARI’s eFlow technology, a handheld nebulizer that turns a liquid into a fine mist. In its statement, Elevation says the combination is expected to significantly reduce the treatment burden and improve clinical outcomes for COPD patients requiring nebulizer therapy.

Elevation’s venture investors include Canaan Partners, TPG Growth, Care Capital, and Mesa Verde Venture Partners. Elevation says it has added Canaan general partner Brent Ahrens, TPG Biotech managing director Heather Preston, and Care Capital’s Jan Leschly to its board of directors.

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.