Baebies, a two-year old life sciences startup, has raised $13m in a venture round backed by Duke University.
The institution made the investment through its venturing arm DUMAC, and was joined by the recently-established Duke Angel Network. Rex Hospital owned venturing fund Rex Health Ventures also joined the round, and Baebies also secured a $500,000 loan from N.C. Biotechnology Centre.
The company is developing technology licensed by Illumina. The genetic sequencing firm acquired Duke spinout Advanced Liquid Logic in 2013 for $96m, and its screening technology was used as part of Baebies’ founding intellectual property. Richard West and Vamsee Pamula, who both worked on Advanced Liquid, have joined Baebies as co-founder and president, respectively.
The funding will be used to support the development of Baebies’ neonatal screening technology. The company hopes that it will be able to start providing its products by 2016.
West said: “We plan to build a very large company. Certainly in the hundreds of people, hopefully bigger than that.”
