San Francisco-based SonoThera has closed an oversubscribed USD 125 million Series B financing round to advance its ultrasound-mediated nonviral genetic medicine platform into clinical development, with lead programs targeting Duchenne muscular dystrophy and autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease. The funding round signals substantial investor conviction in a delivery approach that diverges from viral vector-based gene therapies, positioning the company to initiate its first clinical trial in DMD in 2027.
Vida Ventures led the round, with new participants ARK Invest, CureDuchenne Ventures, Leaps by Bayer, Otsuka Pharmaceutical, SymBiosis, UCB Ventures SA, and Vivo Capital. Existing investors ARCH Venture Partners, Alexandria Venture Investments, Duquesne Family Office, Illumina Ventures, Johnson & Johnson Innovation — JJDC, Inc., Medical Excellence Capital, RA Capital, and Vertex Ventures HC also participated.
In connection with the financing, Rajul Jain, M.D., Managing Director at Vida Ventures, and Rakhshita Dhar, M.S., Vice President and Head of Healthcare Venture Investments at Leaps by Bayer, have joined SonoThera’s board of directors.
The company said proceeds will advance its DMD and ADPKD genetic medicine programs into clinical trials, expand its pipeline across multiple organ systems, and further scale its proprietary platform technologies. No prior funding rounds were disclosed in the announcement, making this the first publicly confirmed capital raise for the company.
The platform science: RIPPLE and PORE
SonoThera’s approach integrates two proprietary technologies. The RIPPLE ultrasound delivery system uses widely available, US FDA-cleared diagnostic ultrasound equipment combined with commercially approved ultrasound contrast agents to create a noninvasive, outpatient procedure estimated to take approximately one hour or less. When applied to target tissues, the ultrasound energy transiently increases cell membrane permeability, enabling uptake of genetic payloads that would not otherwise cross cellular barriers efficiently.
The PORE payload engineering platform supports a range of genetic medicine modalities, including DNA and RNA therapeutics, gene editing, and gene silencing approaches. Together, the two systems are designed to enable targeted, redosable delivery of large genetic payloads — a combination of attributes that has proved difficult to achieve with viral vectors.
Conventional adeno-associated virus gene therapies face well-documented constraints: packaging capacity is limited to approximately 4.7 kilobases, pre-existing immunity can blunt efficacy, immune responses to the viral capsid can pose safety risks, and redosing is generally not feasible. SonoThera’s nonviral platform is designed to address each of these limitations, and the company has reported preclinical delivery of full-length dystrophin — the gene mutated in DMD, which at approximately 14 kilobases far exceeds AAV capacity — as well as RNA-based payloads for gene silencing. Targeted delivery and expression have been demonstrated across skeletal muscle, heart, liver, kidney, adipose tissue, and brain in preclinical studies.
The lead program targets Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a severe progressive muscle-wasting disease caused by mutations in the dystrophin gene. Current approved therapies include exon-skipping approaches that restore partial dystrophin function, but delivery of a full-length dystrophin construct has remained an unresolved challenge for the field. SonoThera has stated its intention to initiate a first-in-human DMD trial in 2027.
The second lead program addresses autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease, a common inherited kidney disorder driven by mutations in the PKD1 or PKD2 genes. Current standard of care includes tolvaptan, which slows cyst growth but does not address the underlying genetic defect. An ADPKD genetic medicine that could silence or correct the causative mutation in kidney tissue would represent a distinct therapeutic approach.
The participation of CureDuchenne Ventures and UCB Ventures SA as new investors is strategically notable. CureDuchenne is a patient advocacy organization with a dedicated venture arm focused on DMD programs including a recent investment in Tevard Biosciences, and UCB has established commercial interests in rare neurological and muscular diseases.
The nonviral delivery landscape for genetic medicines is competitive, with lipid nanoparticles representing the dominant alternative to viral vectors. LNP-based approaches have achieved regulatory approval in liver-targeted applications — including RNA interference therapies and mRNA vaccines — but extrahepatic delivery remains technically challenging. SonoThera’s ultrasound-guided approach offers tissue specificity through physical targeting rather than relying solely on ligand-receptor interactions or passive organ accumulation, which the company argues enables access to muscle, kidney, and other non-hepatic tissues that LNP platforms have struggled to reach reliably.
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