AstraZeneca is stepping further into the obesity field with an option for a fledgling startup that seeks to preserve muscle mass, a common concern for the GLP-1 medicines currently on the market.
The startup, SixPeaks Bio, came out of stealth on Wednesday with $30 million in Series A funding. Incubated by Versant Ventures, the deal with AstraZeneca will also let SixPeaks tap into as much as $80 million in non-dilutive financing over the next two years.
During that time, the UK pharma giant can buy Basel-based SixPeaks at an “agreed-upon price” when the first clinical trial application is submitted, the companies said.
The announcement comes as AstraZeneca is building up its weight loss portfolio. An oral GLP-1 that it bought from Eccogene last fall for $185 million upfront is one of three obesity assets that AstraZeneca thinks could reach $5 billion or more in peak sales, it said at an investor day on Tuesday.
SixPeaks joins a deep field of obesity drug developers that have recently secured financing for new approaches. The space includes anti-aging startup BioAge Labs, ATP-incubated Deep Apple Therapeutics, ARCH-backed Metsera, Lilly-supported OrsoBio and Hercules, a new $400 million biotech from Bain Capital, RTW and Atlas Venture.
Muscle loss is a known side effect of the weight loss drugs from Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, and Lilly last year acquired a muscle preservation-focused biotech, named Versanis Bio, in a deal worth as much as $1.9 billion.
“Late last year, we started to socialize this to both pharmas and investors and we got very good traction,” chair Alex Mayweg, managing director at Versant, told Endpoints News. “Over January at JP Morgan, this became very intense, both on investors and multiple pharmas.” He said AstraZeneca “convinced us that this would be the best and fastest way to get this molecule in and through clinic and into patients.”
SixPeaks’ focus is on developing a dual-specific antibody that goes after activin type IIa and IIb receptors. The goal is to make a low-dose medicine that patients can inject themselves, CEO Philip Just Larsen said in an interview. Regeneron is also targeting activin with its candidate garetosmab, which is being studied in combination with the pharma’s myostatin inhibitor trevogrumab in a Phase 2.
“Rather than being a repositioned product here, we designed this antibody completely from scratch and actually built in all the properties” that the company wanted, Mayweg said.
The lead antibody will go into IND-preparing studies in a “couple of months” with the goal of opening an IND by the second half of 2025, Larsen said. A second candidate, which conjugates GLP-1 to the activin antibody, is projected to reach an IND by the first half of 2026, he said. The startup is working on other incretin-based molecules for weight management and associated comorbidities, as well.
Larsen has seen a lot of different approaches to the space during his three decades in pharma, including a GLP-1 agonist at Zealand Pharma in the late 90s, as well as stints at Novo Nordisk; Eli Lilly’s diabetes unit; AstraZeneca’s cardio, diabetes and obesity team; Sanofi’s diabetes research arm and elsewhere. He’s also currently chair of Antag Therapeutics, a Danish obesity biotech.
“Six Pack Bio” was the startup’s original code name, Mayweg said. When certain receptors are knocked out, certain animal species get a muscular abdomen. The company chose to switch pack to “peak” because of the mountainous backdrop of its home country.