MT-302

With CREATE Medicines' in vivo cell therapy for liver cancer already generating enthusiasm, the biotech is now aiming to move forward its experimental autoimmune disease treatments. The drugmaker raised a $122-million series B on Thursday to advance an early-stage portfolio of cell therapies developed with its mRNA lipid nanoparticle (mRNA-LNP) platform CREATE is engineering off-the-shelf immunotherapies that can be dosed repeatedly and manufactured in a scalable fashion. Its mRNA-LNP CARs enable the direct programming of T cells, NK cells and myeloid cells within the body.The megaround, co-led by Newpath Partners, ARCH Venture Partners and Hatteras Venture Partners with participation from Alexandria Venture Investments, will help CREATE move its CD19-targeted in vivo CAR-T therapy, CRT-402, into the clinic. The funds will also be used to expand its dual CD19/BCMA CAR programme across refractory autoimmune indications.According to CREATE, non-human primate studies of CRT-402 showed the cell therapy can deplete B cells in a deep and durable manner, suggesting that with repeat dosing, it could reset a patient's immune system. Outside of the autoimmune disease space, the biotech has two oncology programmes already in the clinic. MT-303 is an in vivo GPC3-targeted CAR therapy being studied in combination with atezolizumab and bevacizumab in a Phase I/II trial involving patients with metastatic hepatocellular carcinoma; the first patient was dosed in December (see – KOL Views Q&A: Early thoughts on anti-GPC3 agents from BeOne, Create nipping at AstraZeneca's heels in HCC).The company's second cancer candidate, MT-302, is a TROP2-targeted in vivo CAR therapy in the Phase I MYE Symphony trial in patients with advanced solid tumours.CREATE claims it has assembled the largest clinical dataset for in vivo CAR therapies, including data from 50 patients treated with its experimental cell therapies.

Create Medicines, Inc., a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based clinical-stage biotechnology company developing in vivo immune programming therapies, has closed a USD 122 million Series B financing round to advance its mRNA-lipid nanoparticle CAR pipeline across autoimmune disease and oncology. The round was co-led by existing investors Newpath Partners, ARCH Venture Partners, and Hatteras Venture Partners, with participation from Alexandria Venture Investments and other members of the existing syndicate. Proceeds will fund the clinical advancement of CRT-402, a CD19-targeted in vivo CAR-T therapy for autoimmune disease, expansion of a dual CAR CD19 x BCMA program, and continued development across the oncology portfolio. The company said it has dosed more than 50 patients across its in vivo CAR clinical programs, which it describes as the largest clinical dataset in the field to date. The Series B follows a USD 73 million Series A closed in May 2023 under the company’s prior name, Myeloid Therapeutics, which was led by Hatteras with participation from ARCH Venture Partners, Moore Strategic Ventures, Newpath Partners, and 8VC. The company launched in January 2021 with more than USD 50 million in seed financing. In conjunction with the financing, Ron Philip, a veteran biopharma executive, has joined as Executive Chairman. Brian Cuneo, Senior Partner at ARCH Venture Partners, and Tom Thomas of Newpath Partners have joined the board of directors. CREATE’s proprietary mRNA-LNP platform is designed to engineer immune cells — including T cells, NK cells, and myeloid cells — directly inside the body, bypassing the ex vivo manufacturing process required by conventional CAR-T therapies. The genetic payload is delivered as mRNA rather than through viral vector transduction, meaning that expression is transient and non-integrating, which the company says enables repeat dosing and reduces the risk of insertional mutagenesis associated with retroviral or lentiviral approaches. The lead autoimmune candidate, CRT-402, targets CD19, a pan-B cell surface marker. By transiently programming endogenous T cells to deplete the B cell compartment, the approach is intended to eliminate autoreactive clones driving conditions such as systemic lupus erythematosus and inflammatory myopathy, with the potential for B cell repopulation from naive precursors following treatment. The company said CRT-402 has demonstrated deep and durable B cell depletion in non-human primates and is being positioned for clinical entry. A dual CAR program targeting both CD19 and BCMA is also in development, designed to broaden coverage across refractory autoimmune indications. In oncology, Create’s MT-303 program targets glypican-3 (GPC3), a cell-surface proteoglycan overexpressed in hepatocellular carcinoma. The program uses myeloid cells as the effector population rather than T cells, reflecting the immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment characteristic of solid tumors, where T cell-based approaches have faced persistent challenges. The company said early clinical data from MT-303 in frontline hepatocellular carcinoma has produced a response profile it characterizes as compelling. A separate TROP2-targeted program, MT-302, is being evaluated in advanced gastroesophageal cancer in the SPaCE-MT trial conducted in collaboration with Amsterdam University Medical Center, registered under European Union Clinical Trial number EUCT 2024-520213-45-00. This article was generated with AI assistance and reviewed and edited by the AllSci editorial team Explore more at AllSci News: https://allsci.com/news/ Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked * Comment * Name * Email * Website Privacy Terms About Us Copyright © 2026. AllSci Corp. All rights reserved.