C-Reveal Therapeutics is selling common stock at a $10 million valuation, which is somewhat steep for a company only operating on theoretical knowledge. However, it is entirely reasonable for what could end up being an extremely valuable piece of medtech — especially since the company hopes to see an exit of multiple billions. Due to C-Reveal’s early stage and uncertainties about its technology, the company’s price score is slightly below average.

One bit of good news for investors is that C-Reveal’s target market — oncology — is sizable and likely to be stable for the foreseeable future. The global market was valued at $136.7 billion in 2019 and is projected to grow at a respectable 11.9% CAGR through 2025. This market growth is being driven by aging populations in developing countries — including the U.S. — as well as sedentary lifestyles leading to worse health outcomes in those developing nations.

While C-Reveal’s technology might not be able to serve as a complete course of treatment to replace chemotherapy regimens and the like, it could greatly enhance the efficacy of such treatments and drive down mortality. This functionality allows C-Reveal to operate in a complementary — rather than competitive — nature with current cancer treatments. By coexisting with other oncology-focused companies, C-Reveal will be able to capture a significant market portion in a large and stable market. Thus, the company’s market score is very high.

C-Reveal’s team — with a long record of high-paying exits — ranks as one of its strongest assets. C-Reveal CEO and founder Thomas Haag holds a law degree from the George Washington University Law School, and a Ph.D. in Molecular, Cell & Developmental Biology from UCLA. Haag has spent twenty years at the intersection of biotech and law. He also serves as CEO for AexeRNA Therapeutics and is a managing partner at both Haag Life Sciences Law PLLC and Linden Lake Venture Capital. Haag also spent three years with Seyfarth Shaw — ranked by U.S. News and World Report as one of the U.S.’s best law firms — as a partner and co-chair of the Life Sciences and Chemical Patent team. 

Mark Cobbold acts as one of several scientific co-founders. Cobbold holds a Ph.D. in Immunology and Immunotherapy from the University of Birmingham. He spent several years there as a Senior Clinical Research Fellow in Tumour Immunology — precisely the field C-Reveal is laser-focused on. Cobbold has co-founded a number of properties — among them are Gritstone Oncology, which IPOed with a $100 million valuation, and Serascience and PhosImmune Inc., both of which have been acquired.

Dr. Keith Flaherty is a managing member and scientific co-founder. Flaherty is a Professor of Medicine at Harvard University and serves as the Director of the Henri and Belinda Termeer Center for Targeted Therapies. He has authored or co-authored more than two hundred peer-reviewed primary research reports and co-founded Loxo Oncology, another acquired company. Rounding out the team is Cyril Benes, who holds a Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Signal Transduction from Pierre and Marie Curie University. He was an assistant professor at Harvard for 14 years and is the Director of Bioinformatics Oncology at GNF.

If curing cancer is the equivalent of a medical moonshot, this certainly seems like a team that could get us there. They are extremely high-level experts in their relevant fields, and their successful exits should reassure investors that C-Reveal’s future prospects are in good hands. It should come as no surprise that the company’s team score is very high.

C-Reveal’s technological standouts are impressive and encouraging. While there is certainly no shortage of competition — some of which this team is at the forefront of — barriers to entry for this field are extremely high. Not everyone has a Ph.D. in bioscience, and the kind of research C-Reveal has undergone to locate the relevant enzymes is expensive and complicated.

Patents for its proprietary technologies are pending and will need to come through to secure the company’s future viability. However, the social impact of helping cure cancer in patients can’t be understated. C-Reveal has also established a solid partnership in Evotec that should provide the sheer experimental power to return results. Due to these encouraging factors, the differentiators score for the company is strong.

C-Reveal is pre-revenue, and its technological research has yet to begin in earnest. In fact, since its founding in mid-2019, the company has yet to conduct any operations, possibly due to a lack of fundraising and the need for exhaustive testing. One thing we all know from our experience with the COVID-19 vaccine development is that medical research takes a lot of time. However, C-Reveal’s partnership with Evotec is a promising step — hopefully the company will be able to show experimental progress shortly. Until that time, the lack of revenue or other forms of traction have netted C-Reveal a below average performance score.

The harsh truth of C-Reveal’s prospects right now is that an investment right now is a gamble on an unproven concept. While C-Reveal’s research appears to conclusively show that its targeted enzymes are responsible for the lowering of antigen levels in cancer cells, that doesn’t necessarily translate to a viable treatment option. Science being what it is, C-Reveal could conduct extensive research through Evotec for years only to find that no medical chemical known to science can inhibit the particular enzymes while leaving healthy cells untouched. In that case, the company could end up as nothing more than a cure in search of a solution.

In addition, C-Reveal’s patents are not yet confirmed. Denied or challenged patents could open it up to challenge from competitors and severely limit the company’s exit prospects. Even should the company successfully secure its patents and discover the key molecules for development of a treatment drug, said development is likely to take many years and be very expensive — acquisition could be a number of years down the road. Potential investors should be very prepared to hold and wait.

It’s very rare for investors to have the opportunity to get in on the ground level of an astonishing breakthrough in health and science. In a world obsessed with exploring every approach and asking every question to find ways to cure its most frustrating disease, C-Reveal’s proprietary tech could be just what the medical industry is looking for. If C-Reveal’s excellent team manages to find a viable drug treatment, it is nearly certain that large pharmaceutical companies will pounce for acquisition — and such acquisitions can be absolutely massive. 

Loxo Oncology at Lilly — which develops new cancer treatments and is co-founded by Dr. Flaherty — was acquired by Eli Lilly for $8 billion in early 2019. While C-Reveal has no guarantee of finding such a lucrative exit, even an acquisition at the level of PhosImmune’s $45 million exit — the company discovered new cancer neoantigens — could see four- or five-fold returns for investors. Depending on the development of treatment drugs and how effective those drugs prove to be in clinical trials, returns could be much, much higher.

C-Reveal Therapeutics is a biomedical company led by Harvard scientists. It is seeking to enhance existing cancer treatments by capitalizing on a pivotal discovery: the existence of two enzymes unique to cancerous cells, which lower those cells’ antigen levels and conceal them from the immune system. By developing a drug that can inhibit those enzymes, C-Reveal hopes its treatment will expose tumors to the body’s immune system, enabling it to attack cancer and destroy it. 

C-reveal’s patent-pending technology is still in the pre-development stage, but the company is helmed by a remarkably accomplished team of scientists with a proven track record of leading biomedical companies to profitable acquisitions. The company plans to use funds from its ongoing raise to kickstart its recent partnership with Evotec and conduct research to find a chemical that can inhibit the target enzymes while leaving healthy cells untouched. Due to its impressive team and potentially groundbreaking discovery, C-Reveal Therapeutics has been rated a Deal to Watch.

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Analysis written by Benjamin Potts.