Alexza Molecular Delivery Corp. privately raised $52 million to thicken its clinical pipeline.

"Our goal is to have four products in clinical trials by the end of the year," said Thomas King, president and CEO of the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company. "One drug entered clinical trials last year and completed Phase I. We'd like to move that one into Phase II and move three others into Phase I."

Alloy Ventures, of Palo Alto, Calif., and Delphi Ventures, of Menlo Park, Calif., led the financing. New investors included Abingworth Bioventures, of Menlo Park, Calif.; MDS Capital, of Toronto; Pacific Rim Ventures, of Tokyo; T. Rowe Price, of Baltimore; and WestRiver Capital, of Seattle. Several previous investors also participated in the round, including the company's co-founder and chairman, Alejandro Zaffaroni.

Alexza has raised a total of $109 million through financing efforts. The company's last round, in September 2002, brought in $45 million. Through seed capital provided by Zaffaroni in 2000 and then Alexza's merger with Molecular Delivery Corp., Alexza received $12 million, King said.

The latest funds are expected to sustain the company into early 2007, King told BioWorld Today. With the new round, Alexza's current cash position is $64 million.

King did not provide details of the four products Alexza has in development, but he said all are therapeutic.

The first product, aimed at migraines, is set to begin Phase IIa trials this quarter. Alexza plans to file three investigational new drug applications, beginning in the second quarter, for products to treat acute pain, agitation and acute panic, he said.

All four products incorporate Alexza's Staccato drug delivery platform. The Staccato technology entails "instantaneously heating drugs to create an aerosol that can be absorbed in one breath," King said, adding that the pure vapor form is absorbed quickly into a patient's system.

Staccato technology is based on the way smokers inhale nicotine into their lungs. The inhaled nicotine takes only seconds to work its way to the brain, making it an effective drug delivery device, he said.

"We wanted to take the general concept and make a safe pharmaceutical product," King said. "And the drug is pure. There's no formulation, so what goes into the lungs is only the drugs."

The Staccato device includes a heating substrate coated with a thin film of the drug and an airway through which the patient can inhale the drug once it becomes vaporized and condensed into aerosol particles. Particle size is controlled by airflow valves.

At this time, Alexza has not licensed out its technology, but King said the company likely will look at partnerships in the future, whether it is for help marketing Alexza's compounds or allowing another company to use the Staccato technology for compound development.

A third possibility would be a partnership involving co-development of vaporizing compounds.

Alexza has screened more than 300 compounds and discovered that more than 160 of those have vaporization capabilities needed for the Staccato delivery system, King said.

"It won't work for all of them, such as proteins and peptides," he said. But he added that vaporization does not depend on whether a compound is water soluble.

"We have water-insoluble compounds that vaporize totally," he said.