When On­colo­gie launched last year, it high­light­ed its trendy mod­el of op­er­at­ing be­tween Boston and Shang­hai amid a wave of Chi­nese cap­i­tal ea­ger to back ex­pe­ri­enced US ex­ecs in de­vel­op­ing West­ern can­cer drugs for the Asian mar­ket. For its Se­ries B, it’s al­ly­ing it­self with an­oth­er buzzy con­cept in the in­dus­try — choos­ing the right pa­tients by bio­mark­ers.

Lau­ra Ben­jamin On­colo­gie

Nan Fung Life Sci­ences and Piv­otal BioVen­tures Chi­na came back to lead the $80 mil­lion round de­signed to speed up clin­i­cal de­vel­op­ment as well as ramp­ing up part­ner­ing and ac­qui­si­tion of new as­sets, ac­cord­ing to CEO Lau­ra Ben­jamin.

Un­der the Im­Clone/Eli Lil­ly vet’s lead­er­ship, On­colo­gie has in-li­censed bav­i­tux­imab and varisacum­ab from Avid Bioser­vices, as well as lefi­tolimod from the Ger­man biotech Molo­gen.

A late-stage fail­ure of bav­i­tux­imab tor­pe­doed Pere­grine’s stock a cou­ple of years ago be­fore the biotech changed its name to Avid. On­colo­gie now wants to test the drug — which in­hibits phos­phatidylser­ine — for gas­tric can­cer in a proof-of-con­cept study, adding to ex­ist­ing tri­als in glioblas­toma and he­pa­to­cel­lu­lar car­ci­no­ma.

Lefi­tolimod is a TLR9 ac­ti­va­tor while varisacum­ab tar­gets VEGF. On­colo­gie has en­list­ed HTG Mol­e­c­u­lar Di­ag­nos­tics in match­ing pa­tients to these drugs in their clin­i­cal pro­grams.

Hagop Yous­soufi­an re­mains the act­ing CMO while chief busi­ness of­fi­cer David Malek and chief de­vel­op­ment of­fi­cer Jes­si­ca Rege round out a lean man­age­ment team.

New in­vestors, in­clud­ing Panacea Ven­ture Health­care and Ko­rea In­vest­ment Part­ners, chipped in.

Digital therapeutics company Better Therapeutics announced on Thursday that it’s cutting 35% of its staff as it awaits FDA clearance for its first product.

The company, which launched eight years ago, is one of a growing group of companies seeking a digital alternative to traditional medicine. The space saw a record $7.5 billion in investments in 2021, according to Chris Dokomajilar at DealForma, with uses spanning ADHD, PTSD and other indications. However, private insurers have been slow to hop on board.

The FDA’s Oncology Center of Excellence has been a bright spot within the agency in terms of speeding new treatments to patients. That flexibility was on full display this morning as FDA released new draft guidance spelling out exactly how oncology drug developers can fulfill both the accelerated and full approval’s requirements with just a single randomized controlled trial.

While Congress recently passed legislation that will allow FDA to require confirmatory trials to be recruiting and ongoing prior to granting an accelerated approval, the agency is now making clear that the initial trial used to win the AA, if designed appropriately, can also serve as the trial for converting the accelerated approval into a full approval.