Money will be used to move lead candidate into clinical testing.

NeuroTherapeutics Pharma (NTP), a company developing therapies for central nervous system disorders, closed a $43 million Series B financing. The company expects the funding to advance its lead candidate, NTP-2014, into the clinic and through multiple Phase II trials. An IND for NTP-2014 is currently being prepared for submission to the FDA, according to NTP.

NTP-2014 exhibited positive efficacy results in multiple preclinical models of epilepsy as well as acute and neuropathic pain, the company reports. The molecule has also demonstrated a favorable safety profile in IND-enabling subchronic toxicology studies.

NTP is developing compounds that decrease or eliminate aberrant excitatory discharges through what it believes to be a new mechanism of action that is unlike any marketed product. “Having worked in this space for many years, it was easy to see that NTP was developing something very exciting. The efficacy and safety data observed to date is extremely differentiating,” says Thomas Beck, M.D., venture partner at Fidelity Biosciences, one of the new investors in the Series B financing.

SR One co-led the transaction and was joined by Fidelity Biosciences and two more new investors, MPM Capital and Pfizer. Existing investors, Novo Ventures and Thomas McNerney & Partners, also participated in the round.

Along with Dr. Beck, Rajeev Dadoo, Ph.D., partner at SR One, Luke Evnin, Ph.D., managing director at MPM Capital, and Elaine Jones, Ph.D., executive director at Pfizer Venture Investments, will join the company’s board of directors.

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