Sonire Therapeutics is getting roughly $13 million from the Japanese government to push an ultrasound cancer treatment toward the market. The money goes to Sonire Therapeutics KK, the firm’s Japan-based group company, which the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization picked for its Deep-Tech Startups Support Program. The company announced the selection on June 17.
NEDO describes the program as one of Japan’s largest government-backed efforts to speed up breakthrough technologies. The funding is non-dilutive, so Sonire gives up no equity for it.
What the money pays for
The award covers manufacturing scale-up, regulatory approval work in Japan, expansion into more clinical indications, and the company’s continuing clinical development in the United States. Sonire is a clinical-stage medical device company, founded in Tokyo in February 2020 and now headquartered in Palo Alto, California.
Its product is a high-intensity focused ultrasound system, known as HIFU. Real-time ultrasound imaging guides the beam, so doctors can watch the treatment as it happens. The system burns away tumor tissue without surgery and without general anesthesia. Sonire says the design is meant to cut the burden of the procedure and open up outpatient treatment for pancreatic cancer, where five-year survival is about 13 percent.
“We are honored to have been selected for NEDO’s DTSU,” said Tohru Satoh, Sonire’s president and chief executive. The funding, he said, will help speed up clinical development, regulatory work, manufacturing readiness and commercialization in both Japan and the United States.
A run of recent milestones
The grant follows several other developments at the company. Sonire has started the SUNRISE-II clinical trial in the United States and raised $18 million in Series A financing. It has also finished enrolling patients in SUNRISE-I, a randomized controlled trial in Japan that is testing the safety and feasibility of its HIFU system in pancreatic cancer.
NEDO’s program runs in phases, and Sonire has already passed through the STS and PCA stages. The award comes in the DMP phase, the program’s most advanced commercialization stage, which supports manufacturing readiness and market preparation.
NEDO is a national agency that backs technology development tied to energy and global environmental problems, using commissioned projects and subsidies.
Sources
- Sonire Therapeutics Awarded $13 Million Through NEDO Deep-Tech Startups Support Program (DTSU) to Advance Global Commercialization of Pancreatic Cancer Treatment
- Sonire Therapeutics Receives $13 Million for Cancer Treatment… | High-Tech Mag
Sources
- Sonire Therapeutics awarded $13m from Japanese…
- Sonire Therapeutics Awarded $13 Million Through NEDO… – BioSpace
