Versa Pharmaceuticals

Versa Pharmaceuticals is a private biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Menlo Park, California, focused on developing next-generation small molecule therapeutics for oncology. The company specializes in the discovery of potent and selective inhibitors of deubiquitinating enzymes (DUBs), a class of enzymes that play a critical role in protein homeostasis and are frequently dysregulated in cancer. Versa's lead program, VP-101 (also known as Versa-1), is a first-in-class inhibitor of Ubiquitin-specific protease 7 (USP7), designed to stabilize the tumor suppressor p53 and promote apoptosis in p53-wildtype tumors. The company was founded by a team of seasoned biotech executives, including veterans from XenoPort and Nurix Therapeutics, with deep expertise in the ubiquitin-proteasome system. Versa is currently advancing its pipeline of DUB inhibitors through pre-clinical studies to address unmet needs in both solid tumors and hematological malignancies.