By Kristy Dorsey
Macomics, a drug discovery spin-out from the University of Edinburgh, has raised a further £4.2 million in funding and announced three new senior appointments as it progresses its work in the field of tackling cancer tumours.
The deal was led by transatlantic scientific investors Epidarex Capital following initial seed funding of £3.2m from Epidarex and the Scottish Investment Bank in the middle of last year. Edinburgh-based investment fund Caribou Property has joined as a new investor in this latest round.
Co-founded in 2019 by the university’s Jeffrey Pollard and Luca Cassetta, Macomics is focused on the role of macrophages in increasing the body’s immune defence against tumours. It has R&D and office facilities in Edinburgh and Cambridge.
In addition to the fresh financing, the company has also expanded its leadership team with the appointment of Steve Myatt, the former boss of Azeria Therapeutics, as its new chief executive. Mr Myatt, who joined Macomics in February, replaces Robert Haigh.
READ MORE: New biotech start-up Macomics raises £3.2m in fight against cancer
Carola Ries, former head of the innate immunity department in cancer immunotherapy at Roche, has been appointed chief scientific officer while Mr Cassetta has left the university to join Macomics full-time as vice-president of immunology.
“Macomics has made great progress since formation, and I am excited to lead Macomics in driving forward its vision to become a leading immune-oncology company pioneering macrophage-based therapies for the treatment of cancer,” Mr Myatt said. “Our diversified portfolio of antibody programs combined with our proprietary target identification approach and world-class team uniquely positions us to deliver on this vision.”
Commenting on his move, Mr Cassetta said: “I am delighted to be joining the company full-time to exploit the potential of macrophage-based approaches to developing novel immune-oncology therapies that have the potential to change the lives of patients with cancer.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here