Juvena Therapeutics did not wake up one morning and decide to chase muscle. This story starts in 2017 inside UC Berkeley labs, where Hanadie Yousef, PhD was deep in aging biology, protein signaling, and a stubborn question most people ignored: why tissue slowly forgets how to heal. That question turned into a company built on one clear belief. If aging breaks communication, regeneration begins by restoring the signal. Redwood City became home base, human stem cells became the source code, and Juvena Therapeutics became the kind of company that moves quietly until the data speaks louder than the pitch.
That work just earned a $33.5M Series B led by Bison Ventures, with participation from Eli Lilly and Company, Jefferson Life Sciences, Mubadala Capital, and Manta Ray. This round did not land on vibes or vision alone. It landed on execution. JUV-161 is already in Phase 1 clinical development, dosing is nearly complete across SAD and MAD cohorts, and FDA Orphan Drug designation is secured for myotonic dystrophy type 1. This is what progress looks like when timelines, regulators, and biology actually agree.
Under the hood is JuvNET, Juvena Therapeutics’ AI-powered secretome discovery platform that treats stem cells like storytellers, not raw material. Jeremy O’Connell, PhD has spent years decoding thousands of secreted proteins into a map of what healthy tissue remembers and diseased tissue forgets. JUV-161 directly activates MAPK and PI3K AKT signaling to restore muscle regeneration, strength, and metabolism. Subcutaneous. Systemic. Designed to work with the body instead of fighting it. In DM1 alone, the market math clears $40B, and that number only expands when sarcopenia and age-related degeneration enter the frame.
This Series B also lands in the orbit of a $650M+ collaboration with Eli Lilly and Company, validating that JuvNET is not a one-program story. As Hanadie Yousef transitions into an Executive Advisor and board role, the company signals maturity without losing momentum. Ben Hemani and the team at Bison Ventures did not just lead a round, they reinforced a thesis that muscle health sits at the crossroads of longevity, metabolic disease, and modern medicine.
