PR85255

SALT LAKE CITY, Aug. 26, 2020 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --

DiscGenics, Inc. ( https://www.discgenics.com/ ), a clinical stage

biopharmaceutical company developing regenerative cell-based therapies that

alleviate pain and restore function in patients with degenerative diseases of

the spine, today announced it has raised $50 million in a Series C funding

round led by Ci:z Investment LLP with participation from new investors, Eagle

Fund SP1 LLP, Medical Incubator Japan (MIJ), and CareNet of Japan. Major

follow-on investments from Mitsubishi UFJ Capital Co. Ltd, the Company's Board

of Directors, and existing long-term investors contributed to the

oversubscription of the round. This latest round of funding brings investment

in the Company to just over $71 million to-date.

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/561675/DiscGenics_Logo.jpg

DiscGenics will use the new capital to support ongoing clinical trials of its

injectable Discogenic Cell Therapy (IDCT) for lumbar degenerative disc disease

(DDD), to fund future commercialization activities in the U.S. and Japan, and

for the scale up and scale out of its allogeneic cell manufacturing facility in

Salt Lake City, UT.

"We are extremely pleased and humbled by the interest and support we have

received in this round of funding," said Flagg Flanagan, Chief Executive

Officer and Chairman of the Board of Directors for DiscGenics. "I would like to

sincerely thank the team at DiscGenics for their tremendous efficiency over the

past several years in the use of our resources and capital to achieve clinical

capacity on two continents while building out our manufacturing facility in

preparation for anticipated commercial demand of our product."

Concurrent with this investment, DiscGenics has added two new members to its

Board of Directors.

Colin Lee Novick is a cofounder and managing director of one of Japan's leading

regenerative medicine consulting firms, CJ PARTNERS, and was selected by Dr.

Yoshinori Shirono, founder of Ci:z Investment LLP, the lead Series C investor,

to represent his interests on the DiscGenics Board. Mr. Novick stated: "DDD

represents a significant unmet medical need worldwide and is an increasingly

prevalent chronic disease among Japan's rapidly aging population. DiscGenics

has developed an innovative biologic approach to treating this condition that

both meshes well with the Japanese regulatory focus on regenerative medicines

and could very much revolutionize the way chronic low back pain is treated. I

am honored to be joining the DiscGenics board to support their clinical and

commercial endeavors."

Najeeb Thomas, M.D. is an internationally recognized neurosurgeon who practices

at Southern Brain and Spine in New Orleans, Louisiana, where he focuses on

treatment of degenerative diseases of the spine. Dr. Thomas stated: "I have

been an investor and supporter of DiscGenics for several years and believe that

IDCT represents a truly game changing opportunity for the treatment of patients

with DDD. If IDCT generates similar outcomes in human trials to the preclinical

studies, which included reduced inflammation of the intervertebral disc and

restoration of disc height, I believe the end result could be reduced pain and

disability, which subsequently translates to decreased pain medication usage

and ultimately to fewer surgical interventions."

DiscGenics is conducting two concurrent regulator-allowed, prospective,

randomized, double-blinded, controlled, multicenter clinical trials in the U.S.

(https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03347708 )and Japan (

https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=2898376-1&h=1676913124&u=https%3A%2F%2Fclinicaltrials.gov%2Fct2%2Fshow%2FNCT03955315&a=Japan

)to evaluate the safety and efficacy of IDCT in subjects with symptomatic,

single-level, mild to moderate lumbar DDD. In the U.S., all 60 subjects have

been treated (

https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=2898376-1&h=186196820&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.discgenics.com%2Fnews-posts%2F2020%2F3%2F3%2Fdiscgenics-announces-completion-of-enrollment-in-us-phase-12-clinical-trial-of-discogenic-cell-therapy-for-degenerative-disc-disease&a=60+subjects+have+been+treated

) and no safety issues have been reported (

https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=2898376-1&h=3122076304&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.discgenics.com%2Fnews-posts%2F2019%2F10%2F28%2Fdiscgenics-announces-us-clinical-study-of-cell-therapy-for-disc-degeneration-clears-final-planned-safety-review&a=no+safety+issues+have+been+reported

). In Japan, IDCT passed the initial planned safety review (

https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=2898376-1&h=3579601452&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.discgenics.com%2Fnews-posts%2F2020%2F1%2F6%2Fjapanese-clinical-study-of-discgenics-cell-therapy-for-disc-degeneration-passes-initial-safety-review&a=IDCT+passed+the+initial+planned+safety+review

) and trial enrollment is ongoing.  

About Degenerative Disc Disease

Degenerative disc disease (DDD) is a chronic condition that is characterized by

inflammation and breakdown of extracellular matrix within the intervertebral

disc. DDD often results in chronic low back pain, which is a leading cause of

disability worldwide (1) and is the most common non-cancer reason for opioid

prescription in the U.S. (2). Each year, 266 million individuals (3.63%)

worldwide are diagnosed with lumbar DDD (3). The condition affects more than 24

million individuals in the U.S. and Canada (3), and is estimated to cost the

U.S. healthcare system over $100 billion each year (1), creating a significant

burden on the economy and individual patients. In Japan, epidemiological

studies have indicated that there could be more than 30 million patients

suffering from spinal disorders in the country, (4) with approximately 160,000

patients needing lumbar spine surgical intervention each year (5).

About DiscGenics

DiscGenics is a privately held, clinical stage biopharmaceutical company

focused on developing regenerative cell-based therapies that alleviate pain and

restore function in patients with degenerative diseases of the spine. As the

only company in the world to develop an allogeneic cell therapy derived from

intervertebral disc cells to treat diseases of the disc, DiscGenics believes it

has a unique opportunity to harness the restorative potential of the human body

to heal millions of patients suffering from the debilitating effects of back

pain. DiscGenics' first product candidate, IDCT, is a homologous, allogeneic,

injectable cell therapy that utilizes biomedically engineered progenitor cells

derived from intervertebral disc tissue, known as Discogenic Cells, to offer a

non-surgical, potentially regenerative solution for the treatment of patients

with mild to moderate degenerative disc disease. For more information, visit

www.discgenics.com.

References

1. Hoy, D., March, L., Brooks, P., et al. The global burden of low back pain:

estimates from the Global Burden of Disease 2010 study. Ann Rheum Dis.

2014;73(6):968-974.

2. Ringwalt, C., Gugelmann, H., Garrettson, M., et al. Differential prescribing

of opioid analgesics according to physician specialty for Medicaid patients

with chronic noncancer pain diagnoses. Pain Res Manag. 2014;19(4):179-185.

3. Ravindra, V.M., Senglaub, S.S., Rattani, A., et al. Degenerative lumbar

spine disease: Estimating global incidence and worldwide volume. Global Spine

J. 2018;8(8):784-794.

4. Yoshimura N, Muraki S, Oka H, et al. Prevalence of knee osteoarthritis,

lumbar spondylosis, and osteoporosis in Japanese men and women: the research on

osteoarthritis/osteoporosis against disability study. J Bone Miner Metab.

2009;27(5):620-628.

5. Yano Research Institute. Medical Bionics (Artificial Organs) Market 2019

report. March 2020.

https://www.yanoresearch.com/market_reports/C61118800?class_english_code=9.  

SOURCE: DiscGenics, Inc.

CONTACT: Lindsey Saxon, lindsey@discgenics.com; or Colin Lee Novick (Japan),

colin.lee.novick@cj-partners.com