biotech Archives

A new Melbourne biotech incubator is on the hunt for startups with $70 million on the table

Startup Daily - June 29, 2023 2 MIN READ

Australia’s newest biotech incubator, Jumar Bioincubator, is seeking expressions of interest from early-stage biotech to be part of the Melbourne-based program. The $30 million incubator will connect early-stage and scaling biotech ventures with state-of-the-art facilities, infrastructure, and support to turn ideas into treatments and commercialise medical research. Jumar is a mountaineering technique where climbers receive… Read more »

Business

Covid biotech Ellume Health placed in liquidation after rival buyer fails to pay up

Simon Thomsen - June 20, 2023 2 MIN READ

Queensland biotech company Ellume Health, which just two years ago was riding high after winning a $300 million US government Covid contract, has been placed in liquidation after a takeover offer for the failed business fell through. The Australian arm of the global business entered voluntary administration last August. It subsequently emerged that it owed… Read more »

OneVentures principal Dr Jeannie Joughin

Funding

OneVentures backs cancer biotech ImmVirX in $25 million Series B

Simon Thomsen - June 5, 2023 2 MIN READ

Sydney VC OneVentures has pledged $15 million as a cornerstone investment towards a $25 million Series B raise for life sciences startup ImmVirX. The biotech startup is developing cancer treatments using oncolytic viral immunotherapies (viruses that infect and destroy cancer cells without damaging normal cells). The remaining $10 million in the Series offered to existing… Read more »

Other

Biotech incubator CUREator tips $12 million into 19 startups tackling global health

Simon Thomsen - June 2, 2023 3 MIN READ

Biotech incubator CUREator has allocated $12 million in venture funding to 19 projects focused on a range of global health issues, ranging from treatments for lupus, motor neurone disease, brain and ovarian cancer, and inflammatory bowel disease, as part of its second cohort. Backed by the federal government’s Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF), which invested… Read more »

ASX

Andrew Forrest doubles down on therapeutic ecstasy biotech Emyria

Simon Thomsen - May 1, 2023 2 MIN READ

ASX-listed biotech Emyria(ASX: EMD), which is developing psychotherapy treatments using MDMA (aka ecstacy) and psilocybin (aka magic mushrooms), has raised $2.5 million in share placement backed by existing investor Andrew Forrest through the healthtech fund Tenmile, part of his private investment group, Tattarang. The $2.5 million placement was jointly led by Perth’s Sixty Two Capital… Read more »

Funding

The biotech startup behind the petri dish of brain cells that played Pong just raised $15 million

Simon Thomsen - April 19, 2023 2 MIN READ

Synthetic biology startup Cortical Labs, which is developing a new kind of artificial intelligence using human brain cells, has raised USD$10 million (A$15m). The Melbourne biotech rose to prominence in October last year when it combined 800,000 brain cells with a computer chip to learn to play the video gam Pong. The project was dubbed… Read more »

Funding

Female-founded fermentation startup Cauldron lands $10.5 million to transform how new foods and fibres are developed

Simon Thomsen - March 27, 2023 2 MIN READ

Cauldron speeds up development of new food, feedstock and fibre ingredients Its hyper-fermentation platform lowers commercial risk & production costs $10.5m Seed round led by Main Sequence + Horizons Ventures An ambitious plan to transform the way new food, feedstock and fibre ingredients are created, by using fermentation has raised $10.5 million in seed funding… Read more »

Funding

Medtech startups can score up to $5 million from a new incubator fund

Simon Thomsen - March 20, 2023 2 MIN READ

A new medical technology incubator program developed by the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) during the former Coalition government will offer up to $5 million in funding for early-stage medical research projects with commercial potential. The $50 million BioMedtech Incubator program is being backed by the MRFF and the Medical Research Commercialisation Initiative. Responsibility for… Read more »

Funding

Andrew Forrest backs Sydney biotech startup in $26 million raise

Simon Thomsen - February 28, 2023 2 MIN READ

Sydney biotech company SpeeDx has raised $26 million for US expansion and to ramp up its diagnostic technologies for illness such such as cancer. The raise included $5 million from Dr Andrew Forrest’s new $250 million VC fund Tenmile, which the WA mining billionaire launched last year with backing from his private investment company, Tattarang. Existing… Read more »

Other tech

Healthtech startup 23Strands is taking genomics mainstream to transform medicine

Apurva Chaudhry - February 6, 2023 2 MIN READ

Biotech startup 23Strands is planning to take genomics into mainstream healthcare through its cutting-edge research and innovations in bioinformatics, scientific literature analysis, and clinical insights based on whole genome sequencing (WGS). A human body contains around 3 billion pairs of genes. But the function of every gene is still not known. Genome sequencing links genes… Read more »

Funding

South Australian biotech startup Ferronova banks $11 million to tackle cancer treatment

Simon Thomsen - January 23, 2023 2 MIN READ

Adelaide biotech company Ferronova has raised $8 million from investors topped up with a $3 million research grant from the federal government for its nanoparticle platform to help surgeons to locate and remove malignant cells in stomach and brain cancers. Irish healthtech venture Renew Pharmaceuticals led the raise, supported by existing backers Uniseed and Artesian… Read more »

Funding

Rapid blood infection detection scale-up Microbio banks $3.5 million

Simon Thomsen - December 8, 2022 2 MIN READ

Queensland biotechnology scale-up Microbio has raised $3.5 million as it looks to roll out its rapid bloodstream infection tests across international markets. Microbio CEO Paul Carboon said existing and new investors, including eminent scientist and Gardasil co-inventor Professor Ian Frazer, had shown strong support for the biotech as it gains regulatory approval in multiple countries… Read more »

Climate Tech

Why waiting for biotech to solve climate change problems could make things worse for the environment, rather than better

Tessa Hiscox & Jack Heinemann - November 29, 2022 3 MIN READ

The world is under growing pressure to find sustainable options to cut emissions or lessen the impacts of climate change. Technology entrepreneurs from around the globe claim to have the solutions – not just yet, but soon. The biotech sector in particular is now using climate change as an urgent argument for more government funding,… Read more »

Funding

Macquarie Uni backs biotech spin-off in $2 million Seed raise

Simon Thomsen - November 28, 2022 2 MIN READ

A biotech startup using gene therapy to tackle neurodegenerative diseases such as Motor Neurone Disease (MND), epilepsy and dementia, has been spun out of Macquarie University with $2 million in Seed funding to launch. Celosia Therapeutics is Australia’s first gene therapy company and the result of two decades of research at the university. It is… Read more »

Other tech

NSW government backs biotech startup Inventia for new manufacturing hub in Sydney

Simon Thomsen - November 28, 2022 2 MIN READ

Deep tech biomedical research startup Inventia Life Science is building a new laboratory, R&D and manufacturing hub in Sydney with support from the NSW government. The biotech printing company will create more than 75 new jobs as it expands from 430 sq metres to around 1500sqm at what will also be Inventia’s Australian HQ in… Read more »