RougeTx

Biotech · Rare Disease · Vascular Therapeutics

Launch

RougeTx launches with $58M Series A for rare bleeding disorder drug

The biotech bets that stabilizing blood vessel support cells can succeed where decades of off-label cancer drugs have fallen short.

• RougeTx launched with a $58 million Series A co-led by BioGeneration Ventures, Angelini Ventures and Kurma Partners, with EIB co-investment via Angelini's Aurea vehicle.
• The Naarden, Netherlands-based preclinical biotech, a Leiden University Medical Center spinout, targets pericyte dysfunction to restore blood vessel stability in vascular diseases.
• Proceeds will advance lead candidate RTX-001, a once-daily oral small molecule, toward first-in-human trials for hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT), including a planned Phase IIa study.
• HHT is the second most common inherited bleeding disorder, affecting an estimated 1 in 3,800 people, with no approved therapies and only off-label options like bevacizumab or pazopanib.
• RTX-001 builds on co-founder Franck Lebrin's 2010 research showing thalidomide reduced nosebleeds in HHT patients by boosting pericyte recruitment to blood vessels.
• The company's periSCOPE platform is designed to extend its pericyte biology insights to identify treatment candidates for other vascular instability-driven diseases beyond HHT.
• The deal is the fourth investment in under a year under Angelini Ventures' €150 million co-investment partnership with the European Investment Bank, launched in December 2025.
• A first-in-class oral approach to vascular stabilization could finally give HHT patients a disease-modifying option instead of repurposed cancer or anti-VEGF drugs.