The round was co-led by Pfizer Ventures and M Ventures, with participation from all existing investors including RA Capital, Samsara BioCapital and SV Health Investors. The Crick is also joining the round as a new investor, the first time the Crick has financially invested in a spinout after the initial company launch. 

Enara is focused on the development of immunotherapies against ‘Dark Antigens’, cancer-specific targets derived from regions of the genome that were historically considered to be ‘dark’ or non-coding, also known as the genomic dark matter.  

In healthy cells, this genetic material is silent. But changes that occur during cancer development can lead to reactivation and transcription of these DNA sequences, causing cancer cells to express unique antigens on their surface which are visible signals to the immune system. Enara’s drug discovery platform is being used to identify the most promising targets for development of immunotherapies that can signpost the immune system towards cancer.

George Kassiotis, head of the Crick’s Retroviral Immunology lab co-founded Enara in 2019 with the support of the Crick’s Translation team and went on to win the Crick’s Sir David Cooksey Prize in Translation in 2018. The company was initially focussed on dormant fragments of retroviral DNA that make up around 8% of our genome and have been left behind by retroviruses that infected our ancestors.

George said: 

The interest in the so-called dark genome has completely shifted and it’s now clear that there’s a huge amount of potential in what was once overlooked. It takes a lot of resource and dedication to unearth these targetable DNA regions and I’m thrilled to see the progression of our research towards developing cancer immunotherapies.

Donna Hackett, head of Business Development at the Crick, said: 

We are delighted to participate in this exciting milestone for Enara. As these immunotherapies progress towards the clinic, we can see how building upon laboratory discoveries can have huge impact for the life sciences industry and hopefully the prognosis for many patients in the future.