Biotechnology startup Helex has raised $3.5 million in seed funding, led by pi Ventures.
Other investors such as Bluehill.VC and US-based SOSV also took part in the round.
The new funds will help Helex continue preclinical research on its main drug candidate for autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) — a genetic condition that affects about 12 million people worldwide and nearly 5% of chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients in India.
With this round, Helex’s total funding has crossed $6 million.
“By solving for kidney-targeted delivery, Helex opens the door to a new class of targeted, curative medicines for millions of patients who currently have no effective treatment options,” the startup said in a statement.
Chaudhuri, CEO of Helex, said, “For far too long, patients with ADPKD have had to rely only on symptom management. By enabling targeted delivery of genomic medicines directly to the kidney, we are developing a transformative therapy that is accessible and affordable for every patient who needs it.”
Roopan Aulakh, managing partner at pi Ventures, said, “ADPKD represents a significant unmet medical need. Gene therapies are emerging as one of the most promising frontiers in medicine. Helex’s mechanism has the potential to be a curative therapy and positions the company to build a differentiated pipeline of therapies for kidney diseases.”
Founded in 2021 by Poulami Chaudhuri, Anirudh Nishtala, and Rohini Kalvakuntla, Helex is a biotech company creating advanced medicines for genetic kidney diseases. It uses its own LNP (lipid nanoparticle) drug delivery system and AI-based drug design technology to develop targeted treatments.
Based at ASPIRE-BioNEST, University of Hyderabad, Helex wants to change how chronic and rare kidney diseases are treated. The company is working on programmable, non-viral LNP therapies that can carry genetic material directly into kidney cells.
Helex’s platform combines AI, genomics, bioinformatics, and gene-editing data to design and test disease-specific genetic guides (gRNAs).
Its main project focuses on Autosomal Dominant Polycystic Kidney Disease (ADPKD) — a serious genetic disorder that affects over 12 million people worldwide and about 5% of chronic kidney patients in India. Helex aims to develop a single-dose, non-viral gene therapy that can stop or slow down the disease’s progression.
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