The round was led by Digitalis Ventures with participation from Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavors.
The company intends to use the funds for the buildout of bioprocess development for its platform of genomically recoded bacteria for the production of therapeutic proteins with enhanced properties, such as increased potency and stability, and improved targeting and delivery into cells and tissues.
GRO Biosciences is leveraging computational protein design and synthetic biology to develop protein therapeutics with enhanced properties. The company has established multiple genomically recoded strains of bacteria that can incorporate non-standard amino acids into protein therapeutics for diabetes, growth disorders and autoimmunity.
GRO Biosciences was co-founded by:
- George M. Church, Ph.D., professor of genetics, Harvard Medical School, will serve as head of the company’s scientific advisory board.
- Andrew D. Ellington, Ph.D., professor of biochemistry, University of Texas at Austin, will serve on the company’s scientific advisory board.
- Daniel J. Mandell, Ph.D., will serve as the company’s CEO.
- Christopher J. Gregg, Ph.D., will serve as the company’s chief scientific officer.
- P. Benjamin Stranges, Ph.D., will serve as the company’s principal scientist.
- Marc J. Lajoie, Ph.D., and Ross Thyer, Ph.D., will serve the company in advisory roles on a consulting basis.
FinSMEs
28/09/2017