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January 2008

Hair-growth tech attracts $5.5M first round

Jan 2008

A Boston biotech has raised $5.5 million in a Series A round of funding to support development of technology aimed at the growth or removal of hair.

Follica Inc.'s treatments stem from technology licensed from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, where scientists discovered that skin, or epidermis, stem cells in adult mammals could be reprogrammed to make hair.

Daphne Zohar, a managing partner of Boston venture capital firm and Follica founder PureTech Ventures, is serving as interim CEO of the biotech.

She said a portion of the funding would be used to launch a search for a permanent Follica CEO to take charge of the company.

PureTech participated in the Series A round led by venture firm InterWest Partners, of Dallas and Menlo Park, Calif., according to the Follica. Chris Ehrlich, a partner at InterWest, has joined the company's board of directors, which includes Zohar and Ronald Cape, another partner at PureTech.

The firm, which employs three people, is developing a treatment that begins with a procedure called microdermabrasion to remove the top layer of skin, said Zohar.

A topical drug is then applied to the skin to induce the skin stem cells to turn into hair follicles. And a separate drug could be used to prevent the development of hair follicles and thus remove hair, she said.

The treatment would be used for people with androgenetic alopecia, the most common cause of hair loss in Americans, Zohar said.

The technology has been tested in lab animals, Zohar said, and the new capital is intended to fund an initial human study. Follica's scientific advisory board is chaired by Rox Anderson, a professor of dermatology at Harvard Medical School, who invented laser hair removal and several other technologies related to hair and skin care.