Roche Venture Fund and 5AM Ventures have joined existing investors including StartX Fund for the oncology diagnostics spinout's $18.2m series A round.
Purigen Biosystems, a US-based biotechnology spinout of Stanford University, closed an $18.2m series A round on Tuesday backed by the university’s StartX Fund.
Roche Venture Fund, the corporate venturing unit of pharmaceutical firm Roche, 5AM Ventures and Western Investments Capital also particpipated in the round.
Founded in 2012, Purigen is developing a platform that purifies DNA or RNA samples to make cancer easier to detect through existing approaches. The technology is based on research by Juan Santiago, professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford.
Purigen will use the money to accelerate research and development as well as commercialisation of its technology. The company hopes to begin sales in the first half of 2017.
Tracy Saxton, investment director at Roche Venture Fund, and Andy Schwab, managing director at 5AM, will join Purigen’s board of directors.
Bill Colston, chief executive of diagnostic platform provider HealthTell and Joe Victor, formerly the CEO of bioanalytical instruments manufacturer DVS Sciences, have also been appointed to the board. Victor has been named executive chairman.
StartX and Western Investments Capital previously provided capital for Purigen, though further details are scarce. Regulatory filings show the company raised a total of $1m in a combination of equity funding, debt financing and convertible notes in 2013 and 2014.
– A version of this story first appeared on our sister site Global Corporate Venturing.
