Valora Therapeutics is developing next-generation multispecific AbLec™ antibodies and T-Lec™ T cell engagers that decoy the glyco-immune checkpoint to create best-in-class therapeutics for cancer and autoimmune disease.
About
Valora Therapeutics is developing next-generation multispecific antibodies and T cell engager therapies that decoy the glyco-immune checkpoint.
Valora is a privately-held biotech company headquartered in San Diego, California, that initiated R&D operations in mid-2024 to develop a new antibody-engineering platform, the AbLec™ technology, invented by Dr. Jessica Stark in Dr. Carolyn Bertozzi's laboratory at Stanford University.
Valora is using the AbLec™ technology to develop novel, best-in-class multispecific antibodies with superior immunological effector activity, and has built a new proprietary platform, T-Lec™, to develop next-generation T cell engagers.
Our Founding Story →Our Science
Cancer immunotherapies can have precise and durable effects for patients — yet only a minority respond to PD-1/PD-L1 checkpoint inhibitors.
Effective immune response to cancer is regulated by tight interactions between immune cells and cancer cells. But many tumors evade immune attack by cloaking themselves in sialic acid-rich glycans that suppress immune activation, through the glyco-immune checkpoint. Elevated levels of these glycans are associated with poor cancer prognosis.*
Prior clinical studies have demonstrated initial proof of principle, positioning the glyco-immune checkpoint as an essential biology to overcome.
The AbLec™ and T-Lec™ represent best-in-class cancer-targeting antibodies and T-cell engagers that overcome glycan-mediated immune suppression.
* Rodriguez et al., Nat Rev Immunol, 2018.
Our Platform
Valora engineers multispecific antibodies that intercept the glyco-immune checkpoint (GIC). Both platforms share a common, highly modular design — including a tumor-targeting arm and a lectin decoy domain — but differ in how they drive targeted immune killing.
Antibody–Lectin Chimera
A multispecific antibody recognizes a specific tumor antigen, decoys the glyco-immune checkpoint to remove a key immunosuppressive pathway, and drives innate immune effector function through an enhanced Fc — all within a single molecule.
T Cell Engager–Lectin Chimera
A T cell engager recognizes a specific tumor antigen and decoys the glyco-immune checkpoint while engaging adaptive immunity — recruiting T cells to drive more potent, efficient cancer cell killing while preserving safety.
Preclinical studies show that desialylation can enhance the activity of standard cancer therapies, such as antibodies and T cell engagers — supporting the development of AbLec™ and T-Lec™ therapeutics with the potential to enhance anti-tumor immunity and overcome the limitations of their conventional counterparts.
Our Pipeline
Valora is developing proprietary cancer therapeutics leveraging the AbLec™ and T-Lec™ engineering platforms.
Our People
Our team and investors have a proven track record of building and scaling biotechnology companies from the ground up and advancing R&D from early discovery through clinical development and commercialization. Valora has built in-house R&D operations spanning early discovery through in vitro and in vivo pharmacological evaluation to support lead optimization and generation of development candidates to advance best-in-class therapeutics into clinical development. Together, our scientific founders and R&D leadership offer deep expertise in oncology, pharmacology, protein engineering, and glycobiology, combined with decades of experience translating breakthrough science into medicines for patients.
Investors
Origins
Valora Therapeutics was founded in 2023 and built upon the pioneering work of Nobel Laureate Dr. Carolyn Bertozzi (Stanford University, HHMI Investigator), a world leader in glycobiology.
Dr. Bertozzi's visionary research into the “glycan code” and its critical role in tumor evasion and immune regulation laid the groundwork for Valora's AbLec™ platform.1 The AbLec™ is a multispecific molecule that was initially developed in the Bertozzi Lab at Stanford University by Dr. Jessica Stark (now at MIT) and colleagues to modulate glycan-mediated immune signaling.
Valora has obtained an exclusive license to the AbLec™ platform technology from Stanford University and expanded its therapeutic use to create a second proprietary T-cell engager engineering approach, the T-Lec™ platform. Both Dr. Bertozzi and Dr. Stark are scientific founders of Valora and continue to serve as scientific advisors.
1 Stark et al., Nature Biotechnology, 2025. Read the paper →
Contact
Co-Founder, CEO & Director
Miguel is Co-Founder, CEO, and Director of Valora Therapeutics. He currently serves on the boards of directors of Rakuten Medical and Arisan Therapeutics.
Miguel brings more than 20 years of drug discovery and biopharmaceutical leadership spanning early research through commercialization. He previously founded Rakuten Medical Inc. and served as CEO, President, and CSO, leading the company from early-stage research through commercialization and the launch of its first product in Japan. Prior to Rakuten, Miguel spent more than 10 years at Vertex Pharmaceuticals and other biotech companies, supporting a broad range of R&D programs from early discovery through clinical development.
Miguel completed postdoctoral fellowships at the Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute and at the Max Planck Institute for Experimental Medicine. He earned his Ph.D. in Molecular Pharmacology from the Institute of Neurosciences at the School of Medicine in Alicante, Spain.
VP, Business Development
James is VP, Business Development of Valora Therapeutics, with over 15 years of experience across business development, pipeline planning, program management, and commercial roles at biotech and global pharma.
James joined Valora from Boundless Bio, where he led business development and corporate development and supported over $300M in private and public financing, including Series B, Series C, and IPO. During this time, he established several clinical collaborations with Eli Lilly, Taiho Oncology, and other global pharma. Prior to Boundless, James led business development at Atomwise, operated in several strategic planning roles at Genentech, and started his industry career in management consulting.
James holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and received a BAS in Bioengineering and an MS in Molecular Biotechnology from the University of Pennsylvania.
Director
Sandy is a Managing Partner with Avalon BioVentures I (ABV), a $135M early-stage life-science venture fund. In this fund he led the $30M Seed financing for Valora Therapeutics and serves on the boards of portfolio companies Valora Therapeutics, AeroRx, and Protalys Therapeutics, where he is also acting CEO. Sandy has a scientific background and 30 years of experience in corporate financing, operations, business and corporate development, and M&A.
Most recently, in Avalon XI, Sandy co-founded Enlaza Therapeutics, helped raise over $200M, and developed a collaboration with Vertex Pharmaceuticals. Previously in that fund he was co-founder and CEO of Nerio Therapeutics (acquired by Boehringer Ingelheim in July 2024 for up to $1.3B). In Avalon X he was CEO of Calporta Therapeutics (acquired by Merck in November 2019 for up to $576M).
Sandy performed his postdoctoral training at The Salk Institute for Biological Studies. He received his Ph.D. in Genetics and his B.S. in Biochemistry from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, where, as a graduate student, he was awarded the Abrahams Memorial Award for outstanding potential for basic research.
Director
Stefan is the Edward C. and Amy H. Sewall Professor in the School of Medicine at Stanford University and Professor of Otolaryngology–Head & Neck Surgery. He is a primary faculty member of the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine and a member of Stanford Bio-X, the Stanford Cancer Institute, and the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute. He previously served as Associate Chair for Research in Otolaryngology.
Beyond academia, Stefan brings extensive biotech board experience to Valora Therapeutics. He currently serves on the boards of Korsa Therapeutics, Avelas Biosciences, and Fortis Therapeutics, and has previously held board roles at Janux Therapeutics, Nerio Therapeutics, and Adanate Therapeutics. He also serves on the NIDCD Board of Scientific Counselors.
Stefan completed his postdoctoral training at The Rockefeller University. He received his Ph.D. in Genetics and M.S. in Biological Sciences from Johannes Gutenberg University.
Director
Audrey is Co-Founder and Managing Partner at 28 Capital (formerly Tiger Gene), where she formed companies and invested in early-stage technologies with high-growth trajectories across the life sciences sector. She currently serves as Chief Business Officer and Board Observer at BrickBio, Inc. and on the Boards of Directors of Valora Therapeutics, Inc., NanoMosaic Inc., and EnCapsid Therapeutics.
Audrey also serves on the Team USA Next-Gen Advisory Board (USOPC) and on the Advisory Board of the Harvard Varsity Club. She holds a degree from Harvard College, where she was a member of the Varsity Women's Ice Hockey Team.
Scientific Co-Founder
Carolyn is the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Chemistry at Stanford University and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the invention of bioorthogonal chemistry and is a world leader in glycobiology and chemical biology.
Beyond antibody-lectin chimeras (AbLecs) for therapeutic applications, her group has invented targeted enzyme therapeutics for immuno-oncology, Lysosome-Targeting Chimeras (LYTACs) for extracellular targeted protein degradation, and site-specific bioconjugation methods for next-generation antibody-drug conjugates.
She is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Inventors, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In addition to the Nobel Prize, she has received the Welch Award in Chemistry, the Heineken Prize for Biochemistry and Biophysics, the Lemelson-MIT Prize, and a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship. Carolyn is a co-founder of Valora Therapeutics, FireflyBio, Lycia Therapeutics, and Palleon Pharmaceuticals, and is a member of the Board of Directors at Eli Lilly and Company.
Scientific Co-Founder
Jessica Stark is an Assistant Professor in the departments of Biological Engineering and Chemical Engineering at MIT and an intramural faculty member in MIT's Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research.
Jessica's career is marked by her pioneering work in developing biological technologies to unlock the vast potential of cell-surface sugars, known as glycans, for immunological discovery and immunotherapy. Jessica led the invention and early development of AbLec™ technology during her postdoctoral training with Carolyn Bertozzi at Stanford University. She is a co-founder of Valora Therapeutics.
