2025 Startups to Watch: LPOXY Therapeutics punches back at gut infection (and a foe with a billion-year head start)

Editor’s note: Startland News editors selected 10 Kansas City scaling businesses to spotlight for its annual Startups to Watch list. Now in its 10th year, this feature recognizes founders and startups that editors believe will make some of the biggest, most compelling news in the coming 12 months. The following is one of 2025’s companies.

Click here to view the full list of Startups to Watch — presented by Morgan Stanley, and independently produced by Startland News — and see how the companies (including this one) were selected.

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Antibiotic resistance is one of the most urgent health challenges today, said Dr. Larry Sutton, noting the rapidly changing nature of the threat requires a solution that bridges medical need and sustainability.

“We are running out of antibiotics that work because bacteria are masters of evolution,” said Sutton, co-founder of LPOXY Therapeutics. “They’ve been here for billions of years, and we’ve been here for a few hundred thousand. They figure out ways to resist.”

A previous venture helmed by Sutton focused on creating new antibiotics, but the market proved challenging, he said. In 2019, five companies with FDA-approved antibiotics went bankrupt because hospitals reserve new treatments for last-resort cases, limiting sales, he recalled.

“I realized that when we say we need new antibiotics, from a medical standpoint, that’s not enough,” Sutton said. “You also need demand from the business side, or nobody will invest the money to make the new ones. And it’s expensive to develop drugs.”

Sutton shifted his focus to a new approach with SIDIFENS, also called LP-102, (C. difficile colitis prevention), an orally-administered drug targeting C. difficile infections. This gut infection can cause severe symptoms, including cramping, diarrhea, sepsis, and even death.

“In America, there are about half a million cases of these infections every year, and 30,000 people die from it. It also costs billions in excess healthcare costs,” he said.

Rather than relying on traditional antibiotics, SIDIFENS uses an oxygen delivery system to raise oxygen levels in the gut, where C. difficile thrives due to its preference for low-oxygen environments.

“This is an anaerobic pathogen, meaning the air we breathe makes it sick,” Sutton said. “The oxygen delivery system we’ve developed raises the oxygen just enough to stop the bacteria from producing toxins and growing, effectively preventing infection.”

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• Elevator pitch: LPOXY Therapeutics is transforming infection prevention with a first-in-class oral therapeutic aimed at preventing C. difficile colitis, a CDC-designated urgent public health threat that kills over 80 Americans every day. Our unique approach delivers oxygen directly to the gut, creating an environment hostile to C. difficile bacteria without using antibiotics.
• Founders: Larry Sutton, M.D., Ph.D. and Porter W. Anderson, Jr., Ph.D.
• Headquarters location: Platte City, Missouri 
• Founding year: 2020
• Current employee count: A virtual company based on Arixa Pharmaceuticals‘ (acquired in 2020 by Pfizer) model, using consultant services instead of full-time employees.
• Funding amount raised to date: $1.25M in private equity investments
• Noteworthy investors: Porter W. Anderson, Jr., Ph.D. 
• Noteworthy programs/accelerators/incubators completed: N/A

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LPOXY Therapeutics reached significant milestones in 2024, including completing Phase 1 clinical trials, which showed that SIDIFENS is safe and well-tolerated, even at high doses.

“All the adverse effects reported were mild, self-limiting, and no different than those in the placebo group,” Sutton said.

The company also expanded its patent portfolio to include more than 15 patents across multiple countries. “These achievements validate the technology and give us a solid foundation as we move forward,” he added.

As the company gears up for Phase 2 clinical trials in 2025, Sutton is focused on raising $30 million to $40 million to fund the effort. He sees partnerships with venture capital firms and pharmaceutical companies as key to success.

“This next phase is critical,” said Sutton, “We’re targeting elderly patients hospitalized for community-acquired pneumonia who are on high-risk antibiotics. By preventing the primary infection, we also prevent recurrences and ultimately save lives.”

The trials will use the FDA’s Limited Population Antibacterial and Antifungal Drug (LPAD) pathway, which allows for faster approval for treatments aimed at high-risk groups with no alternatives. “There’s nothing currently available to stop these infections, so our approach could be life-changing,” he said.

Long-term, Sutton envisions LPOXY Therapeutics as a chance to save lives while addressing a critical market gap.

“Ultimately, we want to prevent these infections and make a real difference in people’s lives,” said Sutton. “But it’s also about creating a sustainable model that ensures innovation can continue in the fight against antibiotic resistance.”

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10 Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2025

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• Hilltop Technologies targets cybersecurity for Main Street (with help from next-gen talent)
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• Noonan scores under par success with digital caddie as golf market earns deepage
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