This is the last straight line for the ” Peanut company “. The French start-up DBV, specializing in food allergies, announced, Friday, 23 march, to have lifted 140 million euros. This last round table, which brought together u.s. investors and Bpifrance, door to 525 million euros in funds raised over the past six years. A record for a biotech habs already valued a billion euros. “We opened the offer to 17 hours and at 18 hours, all was finished ! “said David Schilansky, chief executive officer and chief financial officer, relieved of the outcome of the races in a market context that is” complicated “.
The origin of this success, a patch invented by two pediatricians and an engineer parisians who could be the first treatment for the allergy to the peanut. The market is promising : in the United States, more than one million children from 2 to 11 years of age were diagnosed, and the majority of them will be hospitalized at least once in their life. “Peanuts are hard to avoid and it is the first cause of allergic shock “, says Dr. Pierre-Henri Benhamou, co-founder of DBV.
Ahead
According to a study published in 2013, the cost of food allergies in children, peanut head, would amount to $ 25 billion (€20.2 billion) per year in the United States. These figures explain why the Viaskin Peanut has everything of a future ” blockbuster “, that is to say, a drug whose annual sales exceed one billion dollars.
DBV is not the only company vying to conquer this market, but its technology gives it an edge. Referred to the surface of the skin, its patch diffuses minute amounts of allergen. Responsible for educating the immune system by activating certain cells present in the epidermis, these molecules do not cross this barrier. This is the big difference…
