Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 25 March, 2024 – EQT Life Sciences, a leading European life sciences venture capital firm, is pleased to share that Novo Nordisk has agreed to acquire its portfolio company Cardior Pharmaceuticals for up to 1.025 billion Euros, including an upfront payment and additional payments if certain development and commercial milestones are achieved.

Cardior, which is based in Hannover, Germany, is a leader in the discovery and development of therapies that target RNAs as a means to prevent, repair and reverse heart diseases. It has initially focused on heart failure, which affects more than 65 million people globally. Current therapies can slow but not halt disease progression.

“Novo Nordisk is the ideal partner based on its deep clinical and commercial expertise combined with its resources to accelerate our late-stage development program, including through larger registrational studies. We look forward to advancing CDR132L towards market approval,” says Claudia Ulbrich, MD, CEO and co-founder of Cardior. “Cardior seeks to address heart failure by advancing a novel class of antisense oligonucleotides that target so-called non-coding RNAs. We aim to not just alleviate disease symptoms, but to address the root causes of heart failure and restore the normal functioning of the heart,” said Professor Thomas Thum, Cardior’s founder, Chief Scientific Officer and Chief Medical Officer.

Recognizing the significant unmet medical need that remains within cardiovascular disease and the breakthrough potential of Cardior’s novel approach, EQT Life Sciences led the company’s Series A financing in 2017, with significant further investment in the Series B financing at the end of 2021. As Cardior’s largest shareholder EQT Life Sciences played an important role in supporting the company’s development and the path towards advancing its novel therapy from preclinical experiments into a currently ongoing investigational Phase 2 clinical trial in 280 people with heart failure who have previously suffered heart attacks.

“Cardior is advancing a truly game-changing approach to tackling cardiovascular diseases. EQT Life Sciences’ investment and active role on the company’s Board of Directors demonstrates our ability to identify and back the most promising biotechnology companies venturing to make a positive impact on human health,” said Christoph Broja, Managing Director at EQT Life Sciences, who will step down from the Cardior Board of Directors upon closing of the transaction. “We applaud the Cardior team for their incredible achievements to date, having built one of Europe’s most exciting biotech companies, and wish them luck for this next stage of the company’s development.”

The closing of the acquisition is subject to receipt of applicable regulatory approvals and other customary conditions and is expected to happen in the second quarter of 2024.

Contact

EQT Press Office, press@eqtpartners.com

Christoph Broja, Managing Director, christoph.broja@eqtpartners.com