$5M Debt Deal for Dicerna Pharma

Ryan McBride6/30/10

Dicerna Pharmaceuticals, a Watertown, MA-based developer of RNA-interference drugs, has raised $5 million in a debt and options financing, according to an SEC filing. Doug Fambrough, who resigned from being a general partner at Boston’s Oxford Bioscience Partners last month to become CEO of Dicerna, told Xconomy at the time that he planned to raise a Series B round of funding for the company within the next few months. Dicerna, which launched in 2007, previously raised $21.4 million in a Series A round of venture capital from Abingworth Management, Oxford, and Skyline Ventures. Here’s an in-depth look at Dicerna’s gene-silencing drugs, which might be able to be effective for longer periods than earlier RNAi therapies.