Series C funding will be used to pay for clinical trials.

Vedanta Biosciences has been steadily raising money for their drug program. In late December 2018, it received a $12 million milestone payment when its microbiome therapy VE202 moved to the clinical stage. More recently, the company netted $27 million in its series C funding round, with contributions obtained from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Rock Springs Capital, Invesco Asset Management, Seventure Partners and PureTech Health.

The latest funding will be used to take other microbiome-derived drug candidates to the clinic, including a phase I/II trial of VE416 in food allergy, a phase II study of VE303 in recurrent C. difficile infection and a phase Ib/II study of VE800 in combination with Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Opdivo in advanced or metastatic cancers. 

Vedanta’s candidates comprise live bacteria and are designed to address imbalances in the gut microbiome, which are thought to play roles in various diseases