Freenome, a South San Francisco, Calif.-based biotechnology company that has developed a multiomics platform for early cancer detection through a routine blood draw, closed a $160m Series B financing.
The round, which brought total financing to $238m to date, was led by RA Capital Management and Polaris Partners, which were joined by other new investors including Perceptive Advisors, funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc., Roche Venture Fund, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, and the American Cancer Society’s BrightEdge Ventures and existing investors Andreessen Horowitz, GV (formerly Google Ventures), Data Collective Venture Capital, Section 32, and Verily Life Sciences (a subsidiary of Alphabet focused on life sciences and healthcare).
The company will use the proceeds to further the development of its early cancer detection blood test powered by its platform.
It plans to conduct a pivotal validation study and submit to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) under the Parallel Review Program the first application of its platform in colorectal cancer screening and expand its laboratory infrastructure and software to support its continued growth.
Led by Gabe Otte, Chief Executive Officer, Freenome provides a multiomics platform that detects key biological signals from a routine blood draw. The platform integrates assays for cell-free DNA, methylation, and proteins with advanced computational biology and machine learning techniques to identify additive signatures that improve the accuracy for early cancer detection given the molecular subtypes of cancer are heterogeneous in nature.
This strategy incorporates a multidimensional view of both tumor- and immune-derived signatures that enables the early detection of cancer, instead of relying only on tumor-derived markers, which may miss the early signs of cancer.
Freenome’s first cancer test is for the screening of colorectal cancer.
FinSMEs
24/07/2019