Brenus Pharma raises €11 million Series A extension to advance immunotherapy for hard-to-treat solid tumours
Brenus Pharma, a Lyon-based clinical-stage BioTech startup aiming to prevent cancer recurrence, has announced an €11 million ($12.6M) extension to its Series A round. This brings the company’s total capital raised since inception to €38 million.
The round was supported by strong follow-on participation from existing investors, including Angelor, UI Investissement (managing FRAI), Crédit Agricole (CACE Création, CACF Capital Innovation), Noshaq, Orsa (formerly Investsud), BIO JAG, and Bpifrance (through non-dilutive funding).
This round also welcomes two new international investors: Sambrinvest and Korea Omega Investment Corp. In September 2024, the company announced the completion of a €22.2 million Series A financing round
“We are proud to welcome international investors who share our vision, and grateful for the continued confidence of our existing backers. This funding will enable us to complete the Phase I program and continue accelerating our in vivo immunotherapy platform by advancing our next drug candidate. I would also like to thank our historical investors for their trust and support,” said Paul Bravetti, CEO of Brenus Pharma.
Founded in 2019, Brenus Pharma develops an off-the-shelf platform advancing novel modalities in immuno-oncology. According to the company, its precision technology mimics tumour protein expression and makes it visible to the immune system. This enables a multi-specific in vivo immune response adapting to tumour evolution in hard-to-treat solid tumours, where current therapies fall short.
The company highlights that it is developing a new in vivo dendritic cell-engager modality for the estimated 85% of solid tumours that remain immunologically “cold” and largely unresponsive to current immunotherapies.
Its off-the-shelf platform combines deep multi-omics capabilities, exclusive tumour-bank partnerships, and strong CMC expertise to mirror the broad antigenic landscape associated with tumour heterogeneity, plasticity, treatment resistance, and evolution.
By engaging dendritic cells, the technology is designed to generate de novo immune responses, convert cold tumours into responsive ones and mobilise the patient’s immune system against evolving cancer, the French startup explained.
Unlike personalised or DNA-RNA-engineered therapies, this scalable approach requires no patient-specific cell manipulation, supporting predictable supply timelines and competitive manufacturing costs.
Its lead candidate is STC-1010, a next-generation in vivo allogeneic immunotherapy built on the Stimulated Ghost Cells (SGC) technology, targeting metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC).
The company recently announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has accepted the company’s Investigational New Drug (IND) application for its first drug candidate, STC-1010, in microsatellite stable (MSS) metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC).
“We couldn’t be more confident in our first investment in France. The company combines truly differentiated technology with early clinical validation and team executing at pace. This is exactly the type of European innovation we want to support as we expand our portfolio internationally. We look forward to supporting Brenus as it advances its innovation toward a new treatment for patients with significant unmet medical needs,” said Dae Kyeong Bae, Senior Vice President at Korea Omega Investment Corp.
Brenus Pharma plans to use this capital to advance STC-1010 (NCT06934538) through its Phase I program and unlock the broader potential of its platform across hard-to-treat solid tumours. This financing also strengthens Brenus Pharma’s international momentum and provides the resources required to reach its next clinical and strategic milestones.
