ChemoCentryx Raises $302 Million to Advance Pipeline of Chronic and Orphan Kidney Diseases

Rare Daily Staff

ChemoCentryx raised $300.6 million in a public offering of 5.2 million shares of its common stock at $58.00 per share.

The financing will be used to advance ChemoCentryx pipeline of oral drugs targeting specific chemokine or chemo-attractant receptors that block the negative inflammatory or suppressive response driven by that particular receptor, while leaving the rest of the immune system intact. Lead programs include therapies to treat orphan and rare diseases, and pipeline candidates for chronic kidney disease, and immune-oncology, inflammatory, and autoimmune diseases.

In November 2019, ChemoCentryx and Vifor Pharma reported positive late stage results from a trial of its lead experimental therapy avacopan for the treatment of patients with anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody-associated vasculitis (ANCA vasculitis), a group of rare systemic diseases in which over-activation of the complement pathway over-activates neutrophils, leading to inflammation and destruction of small blood vessels and results in organ damage and failure, with the kidney as the major target.

Avacopan has Orphan Drug designation in the United States and PRIME designation in the European Union. ChemoCentryx plans to file for marketing approval as a treatment for ANCA vasculitis in the U.S. and Europe before the end of this year.

Avacopan is also being studied as a treatment for C3 Glomeruopathy, an ultra-rare kidney disease, and hidradenitis suppurativa, a skin condition that causes small, painful lumps to form under the skin.