philadelphia-biotech
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Peroxitech Put $25 Million Behind a Nine-Amino-Acid Bet on Saving Injured Lungs
The Philadelphia spinout is trying to stop acute lung injury before oxidative damage snowballs. Its unusually small peptide has survived mice, pigs and a $25 million financing - but the decisive human test still lies ahead.
Dispatch Bio
Dispatch Bio is a Philadelphia-based cancer biotech that emerged from stealth in July 2025 with $216 million to pursue a 'universal' immunotherapy for solid tumors. Its first-in-class Flare platform uses an engineered virus to install a synthetic, tumor-specific antigen on cancer cells while remodeling the tumor's immune-suppressive environment, effectively giving CAR T cells a target where none existed. Founded in 2022 out of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy and ARCH Venture Partners, the company is led by CEO Sabah Oney and counts CAR T pioneer Carl June among its scientific co-founders.
GEMMA Biotherapeutics
GEMMA Biotherapeutics (GEMMABio) is a Philadelphia-based gene therapy company spun out of the University of Pennsylvania and founded by AAV pioneer James M. Wilson. Launched in October 2024 with $34 million in seed funding, GEMMABio builds the research, manufacturing, and product-development infrastructure to move adeno-associated virus (AAV) gene therapies from the bench to the bedside faster and more affordably - with a focus on rare and ultra-orphan inherited diseases and a stated commitment to global patient access.
Fore Biotherapeutics
Fore Biotherapeutics is a Philadelphia-based, registration-stage precision oncology company developing targeted therapies for patients with hard-to-treat cancers. Its lead candidate, plixorafenib, is a next-generation BRAF inhibitor (a 'dimer breaker') aimed at BRAF-altered solid tumors, including BRAF V600E-mutated high-grade glioma, for which it received FDA Breakthrough Therapy Designation in 2026. Spun out of the Israeli functional-genomics company NovellusDx, Fore has raised more than $200M to push plixorafenib toward an accelerated FDA approval pathway.
Seneca Therapeutics, Inc.
Seneca Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing targeted oncolytic immunotherapeutics built on SVV-001, a non-pathogenic Seneca Valley Virus that selectively replicates in solid-tumor cells expressing the TEM8/ANTXR1 receptor. Founded by oncolytic-virus pioneer Dr. Paul Hallenbeck, the company pairs SVV-001 with immune modulators and checkpoint inhibitors to spark systemic anti-tumor immunity, and is advancing a Phase I/II trial in high-grade neuroendocrine neoplasms while building a pipeline of armed and neo-antigen viral constructs.