autoimmune-disease
(33)
Arcellx
Arcellx rebuilt a crucial part of CAR-T therapy with a compact synthetic binder. Its lead treatment is now under FDA review - and the company behind it has become part of Gilead's Kite.
Adam Townsend
He spent two decades launching other people's medicines. Now he is running a biotech built to delete the antibodies that make patients sick - and taking the top job for the first time.
Daniel Getts
Daniel Getts, PhD, is the co-founder and CEO of CREATE Medicines (formerly Myeloid Therapeutics), a Cambridge, Massachusetts biotech building RNA-based in vivo immune programming therapies that reprogram T cells, NK cells and myeloid cells directly inside the body. An immunologist trained at the University of Sydney with an MBA from Western Michigan, he previously founded Cour Pharmaceuticals and served as VP of Research at TCR2 Therapeutics. He has more than 45 peer-reviewed publications, multiple issued patents, and a track record of large pharma partnerships, including Takeda's $420M licensing deal for TIMP-GLIA. In May 2026 CREATE closed a $122 million Series B to advance its in vivo CAR pipeline across autoimmune disease and oncology.
CREATE Medicines
CREATE Medicines is a Cambridge, Massachusetts clinical-stage biotech building in vivo immune programming - therapies that use an mRNA-lipid nanoparticle platform to turn a patient's own T cells, NK cells, and myeloid cells into chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) cells directly inside the body, rather than extracting and re-engineering them in a lab. Formerly Myeloid Therapeutics, the company rebranded in October 2025 as its pipeline expanded beyond myeloid cells and cancer into autoimmune disease and fibrosis. Its repeat-dosable, off-the-shelf approach aims to make CAR therapy cheaper and more scalable than conventional cell therapy, and the company says it has dosed more than 50 patients - among the largest clinical datasets for in vivo CAR to date.
Merida Biosciences
Merida Biosciences is a Cambridge, Massachusetts biotechnology company developing a new class of engineered Fc biotherapeutics that selectively bind and eliminate the disease-causing antibodies behind autoimmune and allergic diseases, while sparing the protective antibodies the immune system needs. Launched publicly in April 2025 with a $121 million Series A, the company aims to treat conditions such as Graves' disease, IgE-mediated allergy and primary membranous nephropathy by clearing pathogenic antibodies and suppressing the B cells that make them - without the broad immunosuppression that limits many existing therapies.
Prolium Bioscience
Prolium Bioscience is a New York-based, clinical-stage biotechnology company developing PRO-203, a bispecific CD20xCD3 T-cell engager designed to deplete disease-driving B cells as an off-the-shelf therapy for severe autoimmune diseases, starting with systemic sclerosis and lupus. Founded in 2025 and backed by RTW Investments, the company in-licensed global non-oncology and ex-Asia oncology rights to the antibody from China's InnoCare Pharma and KeyMed Biosciences, and launched publicly in March 2026 with a $50 million Series A alongside first-patient dosing.
Apeximmune Therapeutics
Apeximmune Therapeutics is a South San Francisco / Burlingame-area biotechnology company developing next-generation antibody therapeutics that harness the immune system to treat cancer and autoimmune disease. Using a proprietary target-discovery platform built on bioinformatic analysis of thousands of tumor RNA-seq transcriptomes, the company has identified more than 30 novel immune targets. Its lead program, AI-306, is a first-in-class antagonist antibody against the novel immune checkpoint AIM-103, and its MEBA platform builds bispecific antibodies that engage macrophages to kill tumor cells. The company closed a $21.3 million Series A in 2025 led by PharmaEssentia.
Axelyf
Axelyf is a Brookline, Massachusetts biotech (with an R&D subsidiary in Iceland) building next-generation lipid nanoparticle delivery systems for RNA medicines. Founded by former Moderna drug-delivery leaders, it pairs a proprietary AXL ionizable-lipid library with an AI model called ANNA to make RNA and gene-editing payloads reach the right tissue with higher potency and less toxicity. In mouse liver studies its AXL LNPs showed roughly 4-5x higher gene-editing efficiency than the LP-01 clinical benchmark at equivalent doses, without evidence of liver toxicity. The company closed $2.6M in seed funding in August 2025 to push its lead autoimmune program and lipid library toward preclinical and non-human-primate studies.
Shennon Biotechnologies
Shennon Biotechnologies is a San Francisco biotech turning immune-cell target discovery from a months-long slog into a same-day job. Its proprietary TCELERATOR platform fuses ultra-high-throughput microfluidics with AI to functionally profile millions of single immune cells in hours, pinpointing the rare T and B cells that recognize cancer antigens. Founded in 2021 by physicist-turned-founder Li Sun, the company is building a pipeline of validated targets for solid tumors and autoimmune disease, backed by a $13M seed round led by DCVC.
T-Cypher Bio
T-Cypher Bio is an Oxford, UK biotechnology company building a pipeline of TCR (T cell receptor) therapeutics for solid tumours and immune-mediated diseases. Spun out of Orbit Discovery in 2021 on technology licensed from the University of Oxford, it pairs a high-throughput, functional bead-display platform with immunopeptidomics, AI and bioinformatics to deconvolute vast T cell repertoires, find disease-specific targets, and identify potent, target-specific TCRs.
Jesse Chen
Jesse Chen is the founder, president and CEO of Fortitude Biomedicines, a Waltham, Massachusetts biopharmaceutical company that launched in January 2026 with $13 million in seed financing. A serial biotech entrepreneur with an MIT PhD in biological chemistry, Chen previously co-founded TRIANA Biomedicines and Avilar Therapeutics, was the founding scientific hire at Kymera Therapeutics where he built its targeted protein degradation platform, and held discovery roles at Moderna and Millennium Pharmaceuticals. At Fortitude he is betting that molecular glue payloads, packaged into a platform he calls GLUE-DAC, can overcome the drug resistance that limits today's antibody-drug conjugates and extend them into autoimmune disease.
WellTheory
WellTheory is a virtual autoimmune care platform founded in 2020 by Ellen Rudolph, Claire Rudolph, and Wallace Torres — all personally affected by autoimmune disease. The company pairs licensed registered dietitians and board-certified health coaches with advanced diagnostic testing to help the 50+ million Americans living with autoimmune conditions reduce symptoms and reclaim their lives. Members follow a 12-month personalized program covering nutrition, sleep, stress, and movement. Clinical outcomes show 92% of members reduce symptoms within four weeks, 85% cut ER visits within 16 months, and average annual healthcare savings of $5,181 per patient. Backed by $33.4M in total funding led by General Catalyst, WellTheory serves both individual members ($175/month) and self-insured employers and health plans like Sentara Health Plans.
Nurix Therapeutics
Nurix Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company in San Francisco pioneering targeted protein degradation - medicines that destroy disease-causing proteins rather than merely blocking them. Built on its DELigase discovery engine that harnesses the cell's ubiquitin-proteasome system and DNA-encoded library screening, Nurix is advancing a pipeline of degraders and degrader antibody conjugates for cancer and autoimmune disease, led by the BTK degrader bexobrutideg (NX-5948). The company is partnered with Roche, Sanofi, Gilead, and Pfizer (via Seagen) and trades on Nasdaq under NRIX.
Adam Freund
Adam Freund is the founder and CEO of Arda Therapeutics, a San Carlos biotech built on a simple, contrarian bet: many chronic diseases are caused by specific cells gone wrong, so the cure is to find and delete those cells while leaving healthy tissue intact. A molecular biologist with a Berkeley PhD and a Stanford postdoc, he spent seven years at Google-backed Calico Life Sciences, where he helped grow the company from roughly 15 to 200-plus people and started its most advanced anti-aging therapeutic program. In late 2021 he left to start Arda as a solo founder with a deck and a thesis, and by October 2024 had raised a $43M Series A led by a16z Bio + Health. His tools are single-cell sequencing to map disease cell-by-cell and antibodies to do the deleting.
Abcuro, Inc.
Abcuro is a clinical-stage biotechnology company in Newton, Massachusetts developing first-in-class immunotherapies that selectively deplete highly cytotoxic T cells implicated in autoimmune tissue damage and certain cancers. Its lead program, ulviprubart (ABC008), is a monoclonal antibody targeting the KLRG1 receptor, advanced primarily for inclusion body myositis (IBM) - a progressive muscle-wasting disease with no approved treatments - alongside pipeline work in T-cell large granular lymphocytic leukemia and T/NK-cell lymphomas.
DeepCure
DeepCure is a Boston-based biotech that uses AI, physics-based simulation, and automated robotic chemistry to design novel small-molecule drugs for hard-to-treat immune and inflammatory diseases. Founded in 2018 by MIT Media Lab researchers, the company pairs deep learning with a proprietary chemical database of up to 10^18 synthesizable compounds and an in-house automated wet lab, aiming to turn AI-generated molecules into real, testable, first-in-class therapies.
Enthera Pharmaceuticals
Enthera Pharmaceuticals is a clinical-stage biotech based in Milan, Italy, developing first-in-class biologics that aim to do something most autoimmune drugs do not: restore the organ, not just calm the inflammation. Its lead antibody, ebrasodebart (Ent001), blocks the IGFBP3/TMEM219 pathway, a signal that drives apoptosis of intestinal stem cells in the gut and insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas. The company targets inflammatory bowel disease and type 1 diabetes, two conditions with deep unmet need, and is advancing the program through Phase 1 clinical trials.
HanchorBio Inc. 漢康生技股份有限公司
HanchorBio is a clinical-stage biotechnology company building next-generation cancer and autoimmune therapies on its proprietary Fc-Based Designer Biologics (FBDB) platform. Founded in 2020 by Henlius co-founder Scott Liu, the company engineers multi-target Fc fusion proteins designed to reach tumors that resist conventional PD-1/PD-L1 checkpoint drugs. Its lead candidate, HCB101, is an affinity-optimized SIRPalpha-Fc fusion protein targeting the CD47-SIRPalpha 'don't eat me' pathway, engineered to spare red blood cells and avoid the anemia that sank earlier anti-CD47 programs. With operations spanning Taipei, Shanghai, and the San Francisco Bay Area, HanchorBio is advancing a pipeline across solid and hematologic cancers and autoimmune disease.
HotSpot Therapeutics, Inc.
HotSpot Therapeutics is a Boston-based clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company pioneering a new class of allosteric medicines. Using its proprietary Smart Allostery and SpotFinder platforms, the company systematically identifies 'natural hotspots' - regulatory allosteric pockets the body uses to switch proteins on and off - to drug targets long considered undruggable. Its small-molecule pipeline spans oncology (CBL-B, CBM signalosome/KRAS) and autoimmune disease (IRF5), with its lead CBL-B inhibitor HST-1011 in Phase 1/2 clinical trials.
Immetas Therapeutics
Immetas Therapeutics is a New Jersey biotech building drugs that target the chronic, low-grade inflammation that drives aging and age-related disease - what scientists call 'inflammaging.' Founded in 2018 by drug-development veteran J. Gene Wang and Harvard aging researcher David Sinclair, the company designs bispecific antibodies and other biologics to reprogram the innate immune system, aiming to treat age-related cancers and inflammatory and autoimmune disease. It raised an $11M Series A from Morningside Ventures in 2020 and partners with GC Biopharma on mRNA therapeutics.
Kira Biotech Pty Ltd
Kira Biotech is a Brisbane-based clinical-stage immunology company developing first-in-class antibody therapeutics that retrain the immune system instead of broadly suppressing it. Its lead candidate, KB312, selectively depletes activated immune cells to restore immune tolerance, aiming to treat difficult autoimmune and inflammatory conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, type 1 diabetes, and graft-versus-host disease. Built on decades of dendritic-cell research from Australian institutes and led by US rheumatologist Dr Dan Baker, the company launched with a A$20 million Series A in 2019 led by OneVentures and IP Group.
Andy Walker
Andy Walker is a chemical engineer turned biotech operator who co-founded GentiBio, a Cambridge-based company engineering regulatory T cells (EngTregs) to functionally cure autoimmune and autoinflammatory diseases. He started as the company's CTO, moved through President and COO, and became President and CEO in 2024. Before GentiBio he ran manufacturing for cell and protein therapeutics at Juno Therapeutics and led Jewel Biotherapeutics. He holds a PhD in chemical engineering from UC Berkeley and a BS from the University of Washington.
Dan Baker
Dan Baker is a physician-scientist turned biotech founder who spent two decades at Johnson & Johnson's Janssen division helping bring immunology blockbusters Remicade, Simponi and Stelara to patients, before launching Brisbane-based Kira Biotech in 2019 as its founding CEO. Kira is developing KB312, a first-in-class antibody designed to selectively retrain the immune system rather than broadly suppress it, aimed at autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and type 1 diabetes. A rheumatologist who taught at the University of Pennsylvania for 18 years, Baker also advises drug-development organisations and serves as a healthcare venture partner.
Marengo Therapeutics
Marengo Therapeutics is a Cambridge, Massachusetts clinical-stage biotech reprogramming the immune system from the inside out. Instead of releasing the brakes on T cells the way checkpoint inhibitors do, Marengo's STAR (Selective T Cell Activation Repertoire) platform builds antibody-fusion molecules that target variable regions of the T cell receptor (Vβ) to selectively wake up the specific subsets of T cells that can attack tumors - and remember them. Launched in 2021 with $80M from Apple Tree Partners, its lead drug invikafusp alfa (STAR0602) is in Phase 1/2 trials, has earned FDA Fast Track designation, and is being studied across cancers that no longer respond to PD-1 therapy.
Progentec Diagnostics, Inc.
Progentec Diagnostics is an Oklahoma City company building blood-based biomarker tests and digital health tools for autoimmune diseases, starting with lupus. Its lead product, the aiSLE DX Flare Risk Index, uses an 11-biomarker algorithm to predict a lupus flare up to 12 weeks before it happens, giving rheumatologists a chance to intervene early. Spun out of research tied to the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, the company pairs lab science with patient-facing tools like the LupusCorner community to move autoimmune care from reactive to proactive.
Jonathan Montagu
Jonathan Montagu is the co-founder and CEO of HotSpot Therapeutics, a Boston biotech he started in 2017 to chase what the industry long called undruggable. His bet: target the 'natural hotspots' that evolution built into proteins to switch them on and off, and you can make small-molecule medicines with precision the old playbook couldn't reach. A chemist trained at Oxford, Scripps and Cancer Research UK with a Stanford MBA, he previously did the dealmaking that put Nimbus Therapeutics and Concert Pharmaceuticals on the map, including a $1B GSK transaction. Under him HotSpot has raised roughly $210M and pushed its Smart Allostery platform into the clinic, presenting first-in-human Phase 1 data on its CBL-B inhibitor HST-1011 at ESMO 2024.
Kim Seth
Kim Seth, Ph.D., is the founding President & CEO of Nilo Therapeutics, a New York biotech that launched in October 2025 with a $101 million Series A to build medicines that talk to the immune system through the brain. A Harvard-trained neurobiologist turned dealmaker, he spent 25-plus years moving between Goldman Sachs, Pfizer, and Repare Therapeutics - where he helped take a precision-oncology startup from pre-Series A to IPO - before betting his own career on the strange idea that the vagus nerve might be the most underused drug target in autoimmune disease.
Lisa Olson
Lisa M. Olson, Ph.D., is a biopharmaceutical research leader who became CEO of Milan-based clinical-stage biotech Enthera Pharmaceuticals in January 2024, after years on its board and as chair of its Scientific Advisory Board. Across two decades in immunology drug discovery - 15 years at AbbVie/Abbott where she helped advance 15 molecules into the clinic including Rinvoq, plus roles at Pfizer and as Chief Scientific Officer of Magenta Therapeutics - she has built a career turning biology into medicine. At Enthera she is steering the clinical development of Ent001, a first-in-class antibody targeting the IGFBP3/TMEM219 pathway for inflammatory bowel disease and type 1 diabetes.
Mohan Purushothaman
Mohan Purushothaman is the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Progentec Diagnostics, an Oklahoma City company building blood tests and digital tools that aim to predict autoimmune disease flares before they happen. He came to diagnostics by an unusual route: a Johns Hopkins Ph.D. focused on pharmaceutical pricing, a Harvard research fellowship, five years inside Roche, and a pricing-software practice he built and sold to Alliance Life Sciences. In 2014 he turned that commercial instinct toward lupus, partnering with the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, and in 2020 raised a $5M Series A led by Plains Venture Partners to bring the aiSLE DX flare-prediction platform and the LupusCorner patient community to market.
Hinge Bio
Hinge Bio is a clinical-stage biotechnology company in Burlingame, California, building next-generation antibody therapeutics on its proprietary GEM-DIMER platform. The platform engineers multivalent, multispecific antibodies that bind their targets cooperatively for dramatically enhanced potency. Its lead candidate, HB2198, is a B cell-depleting agent targeting both CD19 and CD20 with enhanced natural killer cell engagement, now in Phase 1 trials for systemic lupus erythematosus and lupus nephritis. The company raised a $30M Series A led by Point72 in January 2025.