While it’s been a rocky year for many, everything is smooth sailing at Kriya Therapeutics—one of biotech’s top money raisers last year—as it continues its acquisition streak. This time, Kriya has snapped up Tramontane Therapeutics and will be developing a nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) program sourced from the gene therapy biotech.
Kriya now wholly owns the Autonomous University of Barcelona (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, or UAB) spinout and its neurodegenerative- and metabolic-disease-focused portfolio of fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21) assets. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Tramontane’s lead program is an adeno-associated virus-vector-powered therapy made to express a consistent level of the native FGF21 protein, which can have beneficial metabolic effects across several organs and is a biological target in NASH, a severe form of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. NASH can progress to fibrosis, also known as liver scarring, and potentially lead to irreversible damage known as cirrhosis or even liver failure.
“We are very impressed with the data associated with the Tramontane FGF21 program, which has consistently established strong efficacy and durability across multiple validated animal models of obesity and NASH,” Kriya co-founder and CEO Shankar Ramaswamy, M.D., said about the one-time intramuscular gene therapy. “The addition of Tramontane’s FGF21 program strategically aligns with our metabolic disease portfolio which also includes a one-time gene therapy candidate for insulin-dependent diabetes.”
