Every day, Global University Venturing rounds up investments from across the university innovation ecosystem in its deal net.
HC Bioscience, a US-based tRNA-based drug discovery and development spinout of University of Iowa, has completed a $24m series A round co-led by Arch Venture Partners, 8VC and Takeda Ventures, a strategic investment unit of pharmaceutical firm Takeda.
Verdox, a US-based carbon capture technology developer spun out of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has picked up $20m in funding from aluminium and energy producer Hydro invested $20m. The companies had formed a collaboration agreement in early 2021.
QuantrolOx, a UK-based spinout of University of Oxford working on machine learning technology to control qubits, has attracted £1.4m ($1.9m) in seed funding co-led by Hoxton Ventures and Nielsen Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of market measurement firm Nielsen, according to TechCrunch. The round also included Voima Ventures, Remus Capital and angel investors Hermann Hauser and Laurent Caraffa.
Senodis Technologies, a Germany-based developer of a technology to automatically identify hot-formed automotive metal components, has raised €1.5m ($1.7m) in funding from Fraunhofer Technologie Transfer-Fonds, the investment arm of Fraunhofer Society, and Technologiegründerfonds Sachsen together with lead investor High-Tech Gründerfonds. Senodis was spun out of Fraunhofer Institute for Ceramic Technologies and Systems in 2019.
Lazurite Holdings, a US-based medical device producer, has received an undisclosed amount of funding from UH Ventures, the investment arm of Case Western Reserve System-affiliated healthcare provider University Hospitals Health System.
Antion Biosciences, a Switzerland-based gene therapy developer co-founded by researchers from the universities of Geneva, Zurich and Pretoria, has secured an investment of undisclosed size from cell therapies producer Allogene Therapeutics as part of a strategic collaboration agreement.
MetFora, a US-based artificial intelligence-powered early lung disease diagnosis technology, has been spun out of University of Arizona through tech transfer office Tech Launch Arizona. MetFora will commercialise research conducted at the university’s College of Medicine – Tucson.
Trestle Biotherapeutics, a US-based kidney tissue engineering technology developer, has been spun out of Harvard University to advance research originating at the institution’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, the John A Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. The company will look to produce bioengineered stem cell-derived tissues to help end-stage renal disease patients get off dialysis and delay their need for a transplant. Long-term, the spinout hopes to fully create replacement organs.
– Additional reporting by Fernando Moncada Rivera
