Drugging the Undruggable: Parabilis Medicines Goes Public

It is hard to discern the lessons of a journey while you’re still en route. In drug discovery, the process is so long, and so capital-intensive, that it can take many years to see how early decisions pan out. Clarity often arrives only when the theoretical ideas that first sparked your excitement become practical results in patients. The evolution of Parabilis Medicines (formerly FOG Pharma) represents exactly that transition. Today, as the company goes public, it is a fitting moment to reflect on the path that got us here, even as we recognize with humility how much work remains to fully realize our goals.

Parabilis increasingly has the clinical evidence to show that our early bets focusing on aggressively hard, "undruggable" targets and creating an entirely new modality to hit them were the right ones. In venture, we frequently back companies that set out to hit unprecedented targets in novel ways, only to watch them pivot when biology pushes (punches, kicks!) back. It is profoundly gratifying to see an original, audacious scientific thesis actually play out.

When Greg Verdine, the renowned Harvard biochemist who founded Warp Drive (now part of Revolution Medicines), Aileron, Wave, and LifeMine, first shared his work on stapled peptides, the clinical path forward was far from clear, but the underlying concept was undeniably compelling. By stabilizing alpha-helical proteins into rigid structures, Greg engineered a method that allowed these molecules to cross cell membranes and engage intracellular targets that the industry had long deemed inaccessible.

Our partnership with the Parabilis team began during their Series B financing in 2018. In the years since, the concept has attracted some of the most talented people we know, and our conviction in the core science has only deepened as we've watched the team translate early theory into clinical reality.

That translation was accelerated when Mathai Mammen took the helm in 2023. I have known Mathai for years through his leadership at Merck, J&J, and beyond. His rare blend of scientific intellect, clinical expertise, and operational rigor made him the perfect person to partner with Greg and steward these assets and this platform. He has a unique ability to look at early clinical data and translate it into a focused, ambitious roadmap. And as everyone who has worked with him knows, Mathai pairs an unrelenting focus on what is best for patients with a tireless commitment to keeping scientists, clinicians, investors, and the broader community engaged and aligned through complex decisions.

Mathai’s leadership, built on top of Greg's foundational science, has fostered a culture of deep intellectual rigor. Today, Parabilis is evaluating its lead therapeutic candidate, zolucatetide, in clinical trials for patients with desmoid tumors and familial adenomatous polyposis, conditions driven by beta-catenin. Seeing the data demonstrate this drug's ability to successfully engage beta-catenin isn't just a win for the company, it is a moment of real validation for this important biology, and for the elegant chemistry that has allowed this team to drug a famously challenging target.

Their IPO is a powerful reminder that when we back founders who ask the right questions and pursue the underlying science with unwavering focus, we open the door to solving problems that once seemed impossible.

Congratulations to Mathai, Greg, Rick Klausner, Weiqing Zhou, John McGee and the entire Parabilis team. The work you are doing today serves as a blueprint for the next generation of precision medicine.