Oxford Nanopore Technologies, a spinout of Oxford University, has secured £70m ($107m) in a round backed by commercialisation firm IP Group.
Unnamed new and existing investors also joined the round, which saw IP Group’s undiluted stake in Nanopore valued at £192.9m, an increase in fair value of £50.3m. As part of the deal, IP Group has contributed £13.9m of Nanopore’s overall haul.
Since launching out of Oxford in 2005, Nanopore has secured £251m in external fundraising. Investors include Odey Asset Management, Woodford Investment Management, Invesco Perpetual, Top Technology Ventures, and Lansdowne Partners.
Nanopore is commercialising nanopore-based electronic analysis systems for single molecules such as DNA, RNA, and proteins. Its devices have potential uses in a number of sectors, including research, life sciences, agriculture, defence, and environment science.
Alan Aubrey, CEO of IP Group, said: “IP Group has been proud to support Oxford Nanopore since the Company’s formation ten years ago. The Company has made excellent technical and commercial progress and the significant developments announced at its recent London Calling nanopore-sensing conference further reinforce our confidence in the Company’s technology. I would like to congratulate the Oxford Nanopore team for all of their successes so far and we look forward to working with them as they seek to achieve their goal of making nanopore-sensing valuable, integral and available to anyone with a question about a living thing.”
