Santaris, which is developing drugs based around locked nucleic acid technology, has been bought for $450m, providing an exit to investors including Novo.

Prometheon Pharma is working on an alternative to needle injections.

Gen9 has received $25m investment from undisclosed investors to apply synthetic biology to the production of drugs, chemicals, foods and other products.

Durham spin-out FScan is exclusively licensing a prostate cancer diagnostic technology to Glide Pharmaceuticals Technology.

The eye disease drug developer raised $102m in an upsized initial public offering as pharmaceutical company Regeneron invested a further $10m.

Qualcomm Ventures has made its fourth investment in India this year, committing cash to medical home treatment service Portea Medical.

Backed by Mercia Fund Management, a third of the funding comes from the TSB Smart Award.

The pharmaceutical companies have reinvested in Epic Sciences, which has raised $30m to fund commercialisation of its cancer cell testing technology.