Kymab was founded by Professor Allan Bradley, FRS, and Dr Glenn A Friedrich in 2010, based on developments in Prof. Bradley’s laboratory at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute.
We raised $30M of equity financing in 2010 from the Wellcome Trust Investment Division to enable the development of our antibody platform and initiate the discovery of therapeutic assets.
Using embryonic stem cell technology, Professor Bradley’s team developed Kymab’s first transgenic mouse platform. In a paper published in Nature Biotechnology in 2014 (PDF version here), our researchers showed that our technology yields an antibody library constituted from 100 trillion different antibodies. From this deep library, we can select rare high-quality antibodies that can be developed into therapeutics.
In 2014, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and The Wellcome Trust made a Series B investment of $40 million in Kymab, followed by further investment in 2015 from Schroder UK Public Private Trust plc (formerly Woodford Patient Capital Trust plc) and Malin Corporation, which raised $50 million. These funds enabled us to develop our single B cell sequencing technology and informatics expertise to deeply mine the human immune repertoire. At the same time, we embarked on the process of drug discovery, establishing an early pipeline.
In November 2016, Kymab secured US$100 million in Series C financing, led by new investors ORI Fund, with participation by Hepalink, as well as follow-on investments from the existing investor syndicate. These funds have enabled us to make deeper investments in the establishing expertise and leadership in several therapy areas. We have invested in the antibody development process, including the early stages of manufacturing. Importantly we established a clinical development team who have taken several of our antibody drugs into the clinic.
In 2019 we completed a $60 million convertible preference share financing with a $30 million investment from LifeArc, a leading UK medical research charity, as well as investment from existing shareholders. These funds have allowed us to continue our investment in our clinical pipeline.
In April, 2021, Kymab was acquired by Sanofi, helping to build on Sanofi’s leading presence in immunology.
In September 2021 Kymab were delighted to welcome to their site in Cambridge UK both John Reed and Frederic Marrache. John (Sanofi EVP Global R&D) and Frederic (Sanofi Global Project Head) met R&D teams and hosted a dynamic townhall.