Big Phar­ma VC firms put $11M in seed funds be­hind can­cer start­up with bold vi­sion

The ven­ture arms of three Big Phar­mas have jumped in to seed a Swiss can­cer start­up with a bold twist on tar­get­ed ther­a­py that, the founders say, could have ef­fects on vir­tu­al­ly every type of can­cer.

No­var­tis Ven­tures, Pfiz­er Ven­tures and Mer­ck’s M Ven­tures, along with Omega and LSP, have seed­ed FoRx Ther­a­peu­tics with €10 mil­lion ($11 mil­lion). The biotech, found­ed by syn­thet­ic bi­ol­o­gy pi­o­neer Thanos Ha­la­zonetis, will look to tar­get and dis­rupt a DNA re­pair mech­a­nism he dis­cov­ered sev­er­al years ago and that, he said,  al­most all can­cers re­ly on to pro­lif­er­ate.

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