NEW YORK – Transcend Therapeutics, a biotechnology company that develops medicines to treat neuropsychiatric diseases, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), has recently closed a Series A funding round of $40 million. Led by Alpha Wave Global and Integrated Investment Partners, this funding round will enable Transcend to launch multiple clinical trials, including a phase II study, with its next-generation psychoactive compound. Transcend has raised nearly $42 million to date.
Transcend Therapeutics, which was founded in 2021 and incubated by leading early-stage venture studio AlleyCorp, develops next-generation psychoactive drugs aiming to benefit the more than 50 million Americans who suffer from neuropsychiatric diseases. While various psychedelics have demonstrated promise for the treatment of PTSD, Transcend focuses on a psychoactive compound that may be more accessible for the tens of millions of patients in need. Its lead compound, methylone (TSND-201), has short-acting and mild psychological effects, and thus likely requires less clinician time than other psychedelic compounds. Methylone has the potential to be used as an adjunctive treatment to existing pharmacotherapies (e.g. SSRIs), making it better suited to integrate into the existing psychiatric paradigm and healthcare infrastructure.
The Transcend leadership team has extensive experience across the full drug development lifecycle, leading to pivotal contributions on 13 FDA-approved drugs totaling $7 billion dollars in M&A and public company value. The leadership team includes:
- Kevin Ryan, Co-Founder and Chairman of Transcend, and founder and CEO of AlleyCorp, where he was co-founder and chairman of MongoDB, Business Insider, Gilt Groupe, Zola, and also previously served as CEO of DoubleClick;
- Blake Mandell, Co-Founder and CEO of Transcend, has spent most of his career working in venture capital – leading AlleyCorp’s frontier technology practice, where he helped incubate Pearl Health – and prior to that was a consultant at BCG;
- Ben Kelmendi, MD, Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Advisor at Transcend, co-director of the Yale Program for Psychedelic Science and the first scientist to receive federal funding for clinical psychedelic research in more than 50 years;
- Martin Stogniew, PhD, Chief Development Officer at Transcend, who holds 40 patents, has led development at six biotech startups leading to nine New Drug Applications and five biopharma exits valued at more than $3.5 billion; and,
- Amanda Jones, PharmD, Senior Vice President of Clinical Development at Transcend, who most recently led clinical development at Axsome Therapeutics, where she led two compounds from IND to NDA, including the first and only oral NMDA receptor antagonist approved for treating major depressive disorder in adults (Auvelity).
“Mental health diseases are one of the leading causes of disability in the United States and globally, yet available treatments are ineffective for many patients, can take weeks to kick in, and frequently have chronic side effects. At Transcend, we’re working to change that, starting by bringing a next-generation compound, methylone, to market as a potential rapid-acting, disease-modifying, non-hallucinogenic treatment for neuropsychiatric conditions like PTSD,” Transcend Therapeutics Co-Founder and CEO Blake Mandell said. “In a published clinical case series, methylone has demonstrated robust responses in patients with PTSD. This funding will enable us to more rapidly enter clinical trials, and ultimately make this – and other – life-changing medicine available to those in need.”
The Series A round was also supported by Global Founders Capital and Emerald Development Managers, among others.
