Hospital Clínic de Barcelona–IDIBAPS has founded Gyala Therapeutics, a new spinoff that focuses on developing novel CAR-T therapies to treat hematological malignancies. To fund this project, the company raised €1.5 million in seed capital from Invivo Partners, one of Spain’s leading biomedical venture capital firms.
The core team for the spinoff will include Dr. Manel Juan, head of the Immunology Service at Hospital Clínic and head of the IDIBAPS research group on immunogenetics and immunotherapy of autoinflammatory and immune responses, who will be in charge of the scientific progress of the program to develop a CAR-T therapy for a new therapeutic target.
Gyala’s CEO will be Claudio Santos, who has extensive experience in building and investing in life sciences companies and in business development, both in academia and industry.
Luis Pareras and Albert Ferrer, founding partners of Invivo Partners, will join Gyala’s Board of Directors along with Rosa Vilavella, manager of the Clinic Foundation for Biomedical Research and IDIBAPS.