Promising outsider
Created in 2013 as a VUB university spin-off, eTheRNA has announced that it will raise EUR 34 million in extra capital. The aim? To accelerate the development of its potential immunotherapies for cancer treatment and of its candidate COVID-19 vaccine. In the latter field, the biotech firm is somewhat of an outsider. “We aren’t starting from existing vaccine technology, nor are we aiming for a vaccine that will generate antibodies against the virus,” Tiest explains. “Instead, we want to train the T-cells of the immune system to recognize and repel a virus attack.”