$30m · Series B · Healthtech · Schlieren, Switzerland
Swiss clinical-stage biotech NovaGo Therapeutics has closed a CHF24m ($30m) Series B co-led by Neurimmune and Pureos Bioventures, with additional existing and new investors participating. The company announced the round on 2 September and said it was complemented by separate non-dilutive support from the Swiss Paraplegic Foundation and Wings for Life – Spinal Cord Research Foundation.
The financing will advance NovaGo's fully human antibody NG004 into SPROUT II, a proof-of-concept study in people with acute spinal cord injury. Neurimmune says NG004 is designed to neutralise Nogo-A, a protein that inhibits nerve-fibre regeneration and neuroplasticity in the central nervous system. Rather than protecting tissue only at the moment of injury, the programme aims to reopen part of the nervous system's capacity to form connections during recovery.
Financing a controlled test of regeneration
NovaGo has moved through a small open-label study focused on safety and pharmacology. The next trial changes the evidence standard: the SPROUT II registry describes a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study of 120 adults with acute incomplete cervical spinal cord injury. It will assess safety, drug exposure, motor function and daily-life functioning across ten sites, while the company says the programme spans Germany, Spain and Switzerland and is expected to complete in early 2029.
That design matters because recovery after spinal injury varies with the level and severity of damage, treatment timing and rehabilitation. A controlled study must show whether changes in movement and daily function can be attributed to NG004 rather than those other factors. The commercial value of the Series B therefore rests on a defined clinical inflection point: evidence that blocking Nogo-A can produce a repeatable functional benefit in people, not only a biological rationale or an encouraging safety profile.
NovaGo was founded in 2015 as a University of Zurich spin-off based in Schlieren. The company says its CHF10m Series A closed in 2019 and the first patient entered the NG004 programme in 2025. Neurimmune contributed the antibody technology and remains a co-lead investor, while the two spinal-injury foundations add non-dilutive capital aligned with the trial's patient population. That combination can extend the runway for a multi-year study, but it does not remove the central development risk: SPROUT II still has to demonstrate a clinically meaningful effect.
