Clade raises millions to advance ‘cloaked’ cell therapies

It is focused on discovering and delivering scalable, off-the-shelf, "next-generation"​ stem cell-based medicines.

The company said the proceeds of the Series A round will be used to advance “cloaked”​ cell therapies. Its proprietary platform enables the immune cloaking of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and the differentiation of cloaked stem cells into therapeutic cells. 

Clade says aim of the “cloaking” approach is to protect any cell therapies from the immune system. “This would allow repeatable administration of off the shelf cell therapies for cancer, for example, instead of using a patient’s own cells as well as a greater chance of success in other types of cell transplantation,” ​according to a spokesperson.

The biotech is led by Chad Cowen, a professor of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and scientific co-founder of Crispr Therapeutics.

He founded Clade “to overcome the clinical limitations of current cell therapies by addressing durability, patient compatibility, reproducibility and scalability to deliver on the transformative potential of this increasingly important therapeutic modality.”​

Martin Murphy, CEO of Syncona Ltd., said Clade’s inherent focus on developing therapies derived from a single engineered cell source has the potential to “shift the paradigm of cell medicine with unprecedented scalability and standardization.”​

“The unparalleled expertise and novel approach to generating stem cell-derived adult T, NK and B cells positions Clade as a leader in developing widely accessible cell medicines,”​ commented Neil White, investment manager, Emerson Collective.