Rejuveron Life Sciences AG (‘Rejuveron’), a Zürich-based biotechnology company developing therapies to promote healthy aging, is pleased to announce that the first participant has been treated in Endogena Therapeutics’ phase 1/2a clinical study of its lead product, EA-2353, a photoreceptor regeneration treatment for retinitis pigmentosa (RP).
See Endogena’s full press release here.
Rejuveron has a near-majority holding in Endogena, an endogenous regenerative therapeutics company, announcing in late 2021 that it had invested a further $20m in Endogena’s $29 million series A financing round, which has enabled it to progress treatments targeting degenerative diseases of the eye.
This is the second program in the Rejuveron pipeline to enter clinical trials and follows the announcement in March that Rejuvenate BioMed, a Belgium-based biomedical company developing novel combination drugs for age-related diseases had commenced its first Phase 1 clinical trial assessing the company’s lead candidate RJx-01 for the treatment of sarcopenia.
Endogena’s EA-2353 takes a novel, small-molecule approach and selectively activates endogenous retinal stem and progenitor cells, which differentiate into photoreceptors and can hence potentially preserve or restore visual function. This gene-independent treatment approach has significant advantages in RP, which has multiple genetic causes. EA-2353 has been granted orphan drug designation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in May 2021.
For more information on the clinical trials, please visit www.clinicaltrials.gov (Reference: NCT05392751).