Q: 2020 was a busy year for ¹û¶³ÊÓƵ, what were the highlights?
A: Last year was extremely busy and I’m very proud of what the team achieved. We completed two funding rounds, raising £3m ($3.8m) in June and £14m ($18.5m) in December, and were backed by a fantastic range of investors including the Neo Kuma Fund and Bail Capital, and entrepreneurs such as Jim Mellon and Richard Reed.
We made excellent progress on the development of our core research programmes, one exploring the use of synthetic 5-MeO-DMT, another studying psilocybin for a rare headache condition, and our third programme focusing on developing new and unique psychedelic compounds.
We also appointed some exceptionally experienced industry professionals to our team, including Canadian medical cannabis pioneer Marc Wayne as our chairman and Dr Steve Wooding, the former head of global commercial strategy for Janssen, Johnson and Johnson’s pharmaceutical division, as our Chief Scientific Officer. And some of the world’s most renowned academics from the likes of the University of Oxford, Johns Hopkins and Imperial, joined our Scientific Advisory Board.
Q: And what about 2021? What’s happened so far this year?
A: We are very pleased to have been awarded clinical trial authorisation from the UK Medicine and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to explore the effects of psychedelic agent psilocybin for treating short-lasting unilateral neuralgiform headache attacks (SUNHA), a rare and debilitating headache condition. This is a ground-breaking Phase 1B study where we’ll be enrolling up to 12 patients suffering from SUNHA to investigate the safety profile and efficacy of low-dose psilocybin as a treatment.
We also appointed Andy Page, who has over 25 years’ experienc
