Adamas Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a privately held company, announced today that it has closed a $40 million Series D round of funding led by aeris CAPITAL AG and DAG Ventures. Earlier investors MDV-Mohr Davidow Ventures and Northgate Capital also participated in the round. In conjunction with the financing, the company announced the election of George M. Rehm, Managing Partner of aeris CAPITAL AG, and David L. Mahoney, a private equity investor, to the company's Board of Directors.
Adamas was founded in 2004 to address vexing global health problems such as Parkinson's disease and dementia, and infectious diseases such as influenza. Adamas uses proven technologies to create precisely calibrated fixed-dose regimens in controlled release combinations that overcome the limitations of monotherapy and conventional formulations. The company has three product candidates in development: ADS-8902, its proprietary triple combination antiviral drug (TCAD) therapy for flu, ADS-5101, a proprietary once-daily extended release (ER) formulation of amantadine hydrochloride for the symptomatic treatment of Parkinson's disease and other disorders, and ADS-8703, a proprietary fixed-dose combination for the symptomatic treatment of dementia.
"Adamas is at an important inflection point with our rapidly advancing TCAD-therapy program for flu and two late-stage clinical development programs for neurology indications," said Gregory Went, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Adamas. "Proceeds from the Series D financing will fund clinical studies of TCAD therapy in the Northern and Southern hemispheres in patients infected with influenza who are at risk of serious outcomes, as well as advance us towards significant regulatory milestones in our neurology programs."
Adamas is pioneering triple-combination antiviral drug (TCAD) therapy for influenza, which is designed to inhibit viral replication at multiple points in the virus proliferation pathway. TCAD therapy includes Adamas' investigational proprietary fixed-dose combination of amantadine and ribavirin, to be administered adjunctively with a neuraminidase inhibitor such as Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphate, Roche). Preclinical data indicate that the in vitro combination of these drugs, each with their own mechanism of action, act synergistically to provide a much higher level of antiviral activity than single or double drug combination therapies. In in vitro studies to date, TCAD therapy also has been found to provide greater antiviral activity across multiple strains of influenza, even those resistant to single pharmaceutical agents. Adamas is accelerating development of its TCAD therapy for influenza A by conducting a Phase 2 clinical trial in the Southern Hemisphere where the novel influenza A/H1N1 pandemic is active, and is preparing to initiate a clinical study of TCAD therapy for influenza A in North America during this upcoming flu season.