RougeTx
Small-molecule therapies restoring vascular integrity via pericyte biology.
The founders
JT
The company
RougeTx is developing disease-modifying, small-molecule therapies that restore vascular stability by targeting pericyte biology. Its lead program, RTX-001, is a potential once-daily oral treatment for Hereditary Hemorrhagic Telangiectasia (HHT), designed to stabilise fragile blood vessels by restoring pericyte attachment.
HHT is the second most common inherited bleeding disorder, yet there are currently no approved therapies — leaving patients with recurrent bleeding and severe anaemia managed only symptomatically. A $58M Series A gives RougeTx the runway to push a disease-modifying approach through preclinical work and beyond.
RougeTx is a spin-off from the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC), built on more than two decades of research by co-founder and Scientific Advisor Franck Lebrin. The company launched on 6 October 2026 alongside co-founder Jérémy Thalgott.
The founding team pairs long-running academic vascular biology from LUMC with a commercial drug-development mandate under CEO Andrew Lightfoot. Its proprietary periSCOPE discovery platform is intended to extend the same pericyte biology into a wider pipeline, not just a single asset.
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