Deka Biosciences has secured funding of $20m in a Series B2 financing round to advance its product pipeline.

MPM BioImpact led the funding round with investors including Leaps by Bayer, Lumira Ventures and O-Bio.

MPM-BioImpact’s Detlev Biniszkiewicz will now join Deka's board.

Deka will advance the clinical trials of its DK210 (EGFR), subject to approval from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the company’s investigational new drug (IND) application. 

Deka CEO John Mumm stated: “We have only raised $55m to date and are already proceeding to dose our third cohort in our Phase I clinical trial. 

“Thus far, we have established safety and clear signs of immune activation in our first two cohorts. 

“We are encouraged by these results and believe that this combined approach will result in safer, more efficacious and cost-effective immunotherapies.”

The company had previously raised $5m and $20m in seed and Series A financing rounds, respectively.

In 2022, these funds enabled Deka to secure a further $21.5m in its Series B1 funding round, jointly led by Lumira and Leaps by Bayer, and make significant advances.

The company also produced drug products in collaboration with Cytovance Biologics, commenced a Phase I trial and expanded operations into a new plant using these proceeds.

It now intends to progress its development of diakines [disease-targeting scaffolds] and carry out activities that enable the IND filing.