Compass Pathways secures $80 million Series B to boost depression clinical trial

(Editor’s Note: this is an article from Crunchbase News by Christine Hall, syndicated with permission as part of a new content and data partnership.)

Compass Pathways’ work on treatment-resistant depression received a big backing from investors.

The London-based mental health care company closed a funding infusion of $80 million as part of a Series B investment round that included participation from existing investor ATAI Life Sciences, as well as new investors, including the McQuade Center for Strategic Research and Development LLC (a member of the global Otsuka family of pharmaceutical companies), Founders Fund, Able Partners, Camden Partners Nexus, Perceptive Advisors, Skyviews Life Science and Soleus Capital.

Compass last raised funding in October 2018, a £25 million (about $31 million) Series A round that included Tim Davis, a doctor and founder of Source Healthcare, and Principia SGR, according to Crunchbase data.

Funding will go toward expanding its program for psilocybin therapy for treatment-resistant depression, a hallucinogenic substance in magic mushrooms. It will also be used on continued research, advancing the company’s preclinical pipeline, developing digital technologies and establishing new academic and clinical research partnerships, according to the company.

Compass said it is conducting the world’s first large-scale psilocybin therapy clinical trial, in 20 sites across nine countries in Europe and North America. It received U.S. Food and Drug Administration Breakthrough Therapy designation in 2018 for that program.

“Our mission has always been to accelerate patient access to evidence-based innovation in mental health. This is more important than ever now, with COVID-19 challenging our mental resilience,” George Goldsmith, CEO and co-founder of Compass, said in a written statement. “This fundraise shows that our investors recognise this urgent need for innovation in mental health, and will enable us to do more research and development, bringing therapies safely to those who need them, as quickly as possible.”

Illustration: Dom Guzman