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Our Focus: Innate Immunity
At IFM Therapeutics, we are transforming immunotherapy to improve the lives of patients with serious diseases. We focus on developing small molecule drugs that precisely target the innate immune system, the body’s first line of immunological response.
The majority of advances in immunotherapy have focused on targeting the adaptive immune system, which historically has been the best-characterized arm of the immune system. While many of these approaches can work well, many patients do not respond to treatment, others lose responsiveness, and some diseases still entirely lack adequate therapy, leaving great unmet medical need. Our understanding of the innate immune system has now matured sufficiently, that we can now think about exploiting this biology to advance a new generation of medicines for inflammation-driven diseases and cancer. IFM Therapeutics has brought together the key academic thought leaders and advisors in this field, along with an exceptionally talented group of pharmaceutical scientists and executives, to make this goal a reality.
By focusing on innate immunity, IFM Therapeutics is looking to solve the limitations faced by current immunotherapies by dramatically increasing the number of patients that benefit from treatment and extending the duration of therapeutic response.
Our Approach: the IFM Model
IFM Therapeutics is pursuing a number of separate programs, each targeting key control nodes of the innate immune system. IFM Therapeutics places each program (or set of related programs) in its own dedicated, independently financed, R&D-focused subsidiary company, which is supported by the common infrastructure, management team and resources of the IFM Therapeutics enterprise. This model allows IFM Therapeutics to provide more focused research and development support to each program, while also distributing shared central resources among subsidiary companies to maintain a lean, capital-efficient operating structure.
IFM Therapeutics, LLC, was formed following the acquisition of the original IFM Therapeutics, Inc. by Bristol-Myers Squibb in 2017. In that transaction, BMS acquired two of IFM’s immuno-oncology programs, a STING agonist program and an NLRP3 agonist program. IFM retained use of the IFM name, its personnel and facilities, as well as all of its remaining research programs. To date, IFM, LLC has established several subsidiaries: IFM Tre, launched in July 2018 and subsequently acquired by Novartis in May 2019, IFM Due, launched in February 2019, and a new incubator entity in December 2019 called IFM Discovery.
An Unprecedented Track Record
Since the inception of IFM Therapeutics, we have advanced multiple, novel programs from discovery to first-in-human studies and beyond.
IFM Therapeutics Has an Unprecedented Track Record
Among the team's achievements in the company's first 3.5 years has been the progression of 3 novel programs from the standing start through to the clinic and the closing of 2 major deals.
2015
October
IFM Therapeutics founded to discover agonists of NLRP3 for cancer.
2016
FEBRUARY
Novel and proprietary NLRP3 agonist leads identified
MAY
Novel and proprietary STING agonists discovered
JUNE
IFM Therapeutics's $27M Series A closed
2017
SEPTEMBER
Preclinical PoC for both NLRP3 and STING agonists demonstrated
SEPTEMBER
$2.32B sale of IFM Uno to BMS closed; IFM Therapeutics, LLC created as a spin-out, and IFM Tre launched
2018
FEBRUARY
BMS dosed initial patient with first-in-class NLRP3 agonist, IFM-1222
JULY
IFM Tre's $31M Series A financing closed (focus on NLRP3 antagonist)
2019
FEBRUARY
IFM Due launched (focus on cGAS/STING antagonists)
MARCH
IFM Tre dosed initial subject with first-in-class NLRP3 antagonist, IFM-2427
APRIL
BMS dosed first patient with STING agonist, IFM-1364
MAY
$1.575B sale of IFM Tre to Novartis closed
NOVEMBER
IFM Quattro and IFM Discovery launched with $55.5M financing from Omega Funds, Atlas Venture and Abingworth
Meet Our Team
We have assembled an internal team—leading scientists and physician-scientists matched with world-class academic advisors—dedicated to tapping the potential of innate immunity. Complementing this sophisticated biological expertise is a team of deeply experienced small molecule R&D experts with proven track record in discovering and developing transformative medicines. Together, we have created a company culture that is imbued with a sense of urgency in furthering our goal of bringing innovative immunotherapies to patients with inflammation-driven diseases and cancer.
H. Martin Seidel
Dennis Dean
Stephanos Ioannidis
William R. Roush
Ed Olhava
Maegan E. Deare
Eicke Latz, MD, PhD
Matthias Geyer, PhD
Jonathan C. Kagan, PhD
Professor of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School
Shwachman Chair in Gastroenterology, Staff Scientist, Boston Children's Hospital
Andrea Ablasser, MD, PhD
Now a Professor (promoted from Associate Professor in May 2021)
Has an M.D. and Ph.D.
Sun Hur, PhD
Oscar M. Schloss Professor, Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Department of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School
Senior Investigator, Program in Cellular & Molecular Medicine at Boston Children’s Hospital
Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Seth Masters, PhD
Associate Professor, Head of the Inflammasomes and Autoinflammatory Disease Laboratory, Walter and Eliza Hall Medical Institute
Florian I. Schmidt, PhD
Group Leader, Institute of Innate Immunity, University of Bonn
Michael Heneka, MD
Director, Department of Neurodegenerative Diseases and Gerontopsychiatry, University Hospital, University of Bonn
Hiroki Kato, PhD
Professor, University of Bonn Medical Center
Director, Institute of Cardiovascular Immunology
Bin Wu, PhD
Principal Investigator, Nanyang Technological University Singapore
Vito Palombella, PhD
Chief Scientific Officer, Surface Oncology
Gary D. Glick
H. Martin Seidel
Jean-François Formela
John Leonard
Paulina Hill
Vincent Miles
Michael Gladstone
Otello Stampacchia
Gary D. Glick
Luigi Franchi
Eicke Latz
Matthias Geyer
Andrea Ablasser
Anthony Opipari
Awards and Nominations
At IFM Therapeutics, we're proud of our team's achievements in science and industry.
