🔒Artizan’s Yale-backed therapeutic targets inflammatory bowel disease

When James Rosen left his role leading the venture capital investment function for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to become president and CEO of Artizan Biosciences, it was a clear signal that Artizan was onto something big.

Rosen’s diverse background includes work in mountain rescue and as an ambulance medic. He’s been involved in research at the National Cancer Institute and at the Duke and University of North Carolina cancer centers. He parlayed that medical insight into work as an investment analyst, Carolina Venture Fellow and partner in the life-sciences team at Intersouth Partners.

In 2010, he was awarded the Eisenhower Fellowship to evaluate the prospects for healthcare innovation in China and Southeast Asia.

The man knows a good idea when he sees it.

At Artizan, the big idea is using science developed in Yale labs — and exclusively licensed to Artizan — to attack inflammation in the human gut.

The immediate target is inflammatory bowel disease, but Rosen makes clear that cracking inflammation could unlock treatments for a host of other diseases from obesity, metabolic syndrome and autoimmune disease to a variety of skin, lung, liver and central nervous system diseases.

He cites statistics showing about 3 million people worldwide suffer from IBD. In the U.S., that number is 1.8 million. Roughly 45% of those cases are defined as Crohn’s disease and 55% are ulcerative colitis

Artizan’s initial product uses monoclonal antibodies to disrupt the bacteria that cause inflammation in the bowel. Rosen explains the approach is on track to enter clinical trials before the end of 2022.

Moving through the maze of steps to win Food and Drug Administration approval of a therapeutic is an expensive process. In March, Artizan raised $11 million in funding from investors that included Connecticut Innovations and Elm Street Ventures. But the key to the deal was an agreement allowing Biohaven Therapeutics the rights to commercialize three Artizan products.

An earlier funding round netted $12 million and was led by Hatteras Venture Partners, Malin Investments, Johnson & Johnson Innovation – JJDC Inc. (JJDC), Osage University Partners and Elm Street Ventures. That 2019 round included a deal with Brii Biosciences to allow commercial development of two Artizan programs in China, upon achievement of clinical proof of concept.

Rosen sees similar commercial partnerships as the path forward as Artizan develops more products.

Rosen points to Artizan’s “legendary” set of founders as a major factor in his decision to come aboard. That group includes Yale’s Richard Flavell and Noah Palm as well as Marcel de Zoete, who has since left Yale to continue his work in the Netherlands. Rosen also points to access to world-class talent and a supportive bioscience ecosystem as factors in New Haven’s favor.

Artizan has a core staff of 12 but Rosen said he expects that number to grow by 50% in the next year. The firm operates in a 4,000-square-foot lab.

As part of its research effort, Artizan has assembled a unique “bio banking program” that includes some 1,500 samples from IBD patients and their families.

It’s a significant industry asset, Rosen says, that Artizan is willing to share with other researchers.