Miniature heart pump developer Magenta Medical said today that New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has led a financing round for an undisclosed sum.
The NEA group includes existing investors such as Pitango Venture Capital and JVC Investment Partners as well as a group of private investors led by Dr. Jacques Seguin, co-founder of ReCor Medical and founder of CoreValve. The financing will be used to advance the development of the Magenta Medical’s two products and support the company as it seeks its first FDA approval.
Israel-based Magenta Medical said its technology aims to improve the outcomes of patients admitted to the hospital with acute heart failure, whether they suffer from cardiogenic shock or from volume overload and systemic congestion.
“Acute heart failure constitutes a heterogeneous family of clinical syndromes and presents an increasing treatment challenge to caregivers and clinical teams,” said Magenta Medical CEO Dr. David Israeli in a news release. “We believe that there has never been a more critical time to develop technologies that bring real and sustained benefits to patients suffering from heart failure. We have great aspirations for our technology and know that the depth of knowledge and resources around the table, led by NEA and Pitango, puts us on a path to achieve great success in the coming years.”
To address the kidneys’ role in correcting the salt and fluid imbalance that is the hallmark of acutely decompensated heart failure, Magenta Medical has developed a transcatheter renal venous decongestion system. This device is designed to selectively reduce renal venous pressure in order to mechanically unload the kidneys, improve renal perfusion and function, and promote fluid and sodium removal. The device has been successfully tested in a human feasibility study, according to the company, which said it is working on a next-generation device.
Magenta Medical’s second product is a percutaneous left ventricular assist device (pLVAD), a miniaturized catheter-mounted arterial pump designed to move blood from the left ventricle into the aorta, unloading the failing left ventricle for hours to days and serving as a bridge-to-recovery for patients undergoing high-risk coronary interventions and admitted patients with cardiogenic shock.
“We are extremely pleased to have Magenta Medical as our first-ever medical technology investment in Israel, as it represents to us the pivotal role Israeli companies play in global life sciences innovation,” said Dr. Josh Makower, general partner and head of medtech investing at NEA.
NEA principal Dr. Tak Cheung has joined the company’s Board of Directors in conjunction with the investment.
Magenta Medical was founded by two serial entrepreneurs, Professor Ehud Schwammenthal and Yosi Tuval, who previously founded Ventor Technologies, a medical device company that was acquired by Medtronic for $325 million in 2009.
