Cytomos secures £5 million for scale-up
Cytomos has raised £5m to scale up production of its cell analysis technology.
The oversubscribed funding round was led by existing investors Archangels, with participation from Old College Capital, Scottish Enterprise and the British Business Bank.
New investment will allow the Edinburgh-based biotechnology company to drive sales of its first commercial product, Celledonia, built on its cell-analysis technology platform AuraCyt.
Celledonia is a bench-top cell analyser which aims to significantly enhance single-cell analysis, potentially transforming biological drug discovery, development processes and biologics manufacturing.
The business employs 21, largely based at its new premises in Roslin, and expects to add another four staff over the next year as it continues to scale operations.
With its sights now set on establishing a foothold in North America, the company has a pipeline of trials planned with global partners and interest in co-development opportunities from technology developers and a top 10 pharmaceutical company.
The development and manufacture of cell-derived medicines is complex and expensive, with a need for solutions to monitor and predict cell parameters in real-time. Scientists are under pressure to bring novel therapies to market, faster and cheaper. But securing access to the right information at the right time is a challenge, frequently resulting in crucial information being compromised at critical stages.
Cytomos' technology AuraCyt is an unbiased, scalable cell analysis platform which addresses this need, providing a low-cost alternative to current systems. Biopharma firms can bring novel therapies to market by up to six months faster, while reducing costs by enabling critical decision making earlier.
“Successfully raising £5m within a difficult market has been a huge boost for the business.
“The result is testament to the team’s hard work in delivering our first commercial product with international early adopters. Cytomos now has the right building blocks in place to scale quickly, establish a foothold in the US, and continue developing our single cell analysis technology to support advancements in biological drug development and manufacturing automation.”
“Cytomos has gone from strength to strength, achieving commercialisation earlier this year marks a critical inflection point for the business.
“With new premises secured and a robust plan to de-risk the supply chain, we’re looking forward to helping David and the team scale their operations and secure access to new markets.”
Cytomos recently relocated after many years in incubator space at Roslin Innovation Centre to the nearby Edinburgh Technopole to scale operations, both within Midlothian Science, and remain a ‘Member’ with Roslin Innovation Centre to continue to benefit from collaboration opportunities and office space.