VitriCell SA, a Liège, Belgium-based biotech company providing solutions for cryopreservation of even the most sensitive cells, closed a €1m ($1.2M) Series A round of funding.
This consists of equity capital of €712k ($872K) from a group of investors comprising Spinventure SA, Gesval, private investors including Jean-Pierre Delwart and members of the Be Angels network, and more than €300k ($367K) in the form of grants and loans from the Walloon Region and the WBC incubator.
The company intends to use the funds to launch its first products based on aseptic vitrification, a new cell cryopreservation method, and invest in R&D for innovative products.
Founded in June 2017 by Delphine Connan (PhD, DVM, CEO), Prof. Luc Grobet (Embryology ULiège) and Fabien Ectors (CSO, transgenic platform manager ULiège) with initial capital of €100,000 ($122K), as a spin-off of the University of Liège (ULiège), VitriCell is a biotechnology company offering innovative and effective solutions for the cryopreservation of even the most sensitive cells. Its technology, based on aseptic vitrification in chemically defined media, enables optimal survival and safeguarding of biological properties for most, if not all, cell types currently used in biological research.
From February onwards, VitriCell will offer a product that vitrifies embryos in a single 60-second step.
With this fundraising, Eric Halioua (MS, MBA, president & CEO of PDC Line Pharma) as chairman, Françoise Leblanc (Meusinvest), Annick Houbrechts (University of Liège), Joseph de Gheldere (president of Be Angels) and Marc-Henri Decrop (business angel and partner in CommonGround Corporate Finance), joined the board of directors.
FinSMEs
23/01/2018