Kailera jumps on weight-loss drug bandwagon with $400 million early-stage funding

Niket Nishant
Updated ·2 min read

By Niket Nishant

(Reuters) -Kailera Therapeutics launched on Tuesday as the latest startup seeking a slice of the booming market for anti-obesity therapies with a rare $400 million in early-stage funding.

Headed by CEO Ron Renaud, who previously led Cerevel Therapeutics and oversaw its acquisition by AbbVie in an $8.7 billion deal last year, the company is developing several injectable and oral therapies for weight management.

Kailera has said its most advanced candidate, KAI-9531, has demonstrated "compelling results" in mid-stage trials in obesity and type 2 diabetes in China.

"Not everyone sees the desired weight loss on the currently marketed products. There have been side effects and numerous supply issues. There's uncertainty around how we're going to treat these patients over the long term," Renaud said in an interview.

Several startups are looking to grab a piece of the market for weight-loss drugs, which could exceed $150 billion by early 2030s, according to some estimates.

Buoyed by the massive popularity of Eli Lilly's Zepbound and Novo Nordisk's Wegovy, investors are also pouring money into smaller companies developing obesity treatments.

Shares of BioAge Labs, a weight-loss drug developer that debuted last week, were trading nearly 16% above their initial public offering price as of Monday.

"In this period of rapid innovation in the metabolic space, I believe that Kailera is poised to make an impact beyond the current market leaders," Renaud said.

Investment firms Atlas Venture, Bain Capital Life Sciences and RTW Investments co-led Kailera's round. Lyra Capital also participated.

"The idea for Kailera was incubated inside the life sciences team at Bain Capital," Renaud told Reuters.

The fundraise is much bigger than typical Series A funding rounds. The median size for early-stage venture capital deals was $5.4 million as of the second quarter this year, according to PitchBook.

Meanwhile, John Milligan, former CEO of Gilead Sciences, has joined Kailera as its board chair.

(Reporting by Niket Nishant in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar and Sriraj Kalluvila)

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