ImmuneBridge, a biotech company developing advanced cell therapy screening and manufacturing methods, announced this week that it is opening its proprietary end-to-end platform to external partners – including small biotech startups and established pharmaceutical companies – alongside a $7.7M second seed round and new executive leadership.
The company’s platform addresses one of cell therapy’s most persistent bottlenecks: how to manufacture living immune cells at scale without sacrificing their therapeutic potency.
ImmuneBridge built a two-part system to tackle this, including a machine learning-enabled donor screening system that helps identify the most effective donors for specific medical conditions – reducing guesswork early in the development process – and a proprietary small molecule that preserves stem cell pluripotency.
Courtesy of ImmuneBridge
Using this molecule, which enables cells to develop into any type of immune cell regardless of repeated replications, the company claims the ability to produce thousands of therapeutic doses from a single donor, compared to the tens of doses most competitors can achieve.
The new $7.7 million USD round was led by NFX, with participation from One Way Ventures, M Ventures, Insight Partners, LongGame Ventures, T.Rx Capital, Healthspan Capital, Sand Hill Angels and two independent investors.
This brings ImmuneBridge’s total seed funding to nearly $20 million USD. The latest round, however, marks the single largest investment made by LongGame Ventures to date.
Dr. Rober Langer, Institute Professor at MIT and Executive Chairman at T.Rx Capital, commented:
“In cell therapy, that foundation is manufacturing, and ImmuneBridge brings a compelling approach to overcoming long-standing bottlenecks.”
The San Francisco-based firm also named Dr. Nina Horowitz as its new CEO, elevated from Chief Scientific Officer. Horowitz joined ImmuneBridge as Head of Research after earning her PhD from Stanford University and built the company’s donor screening system.
Rui Tostoes, an expert in cell therapy and manufacturing design, was also appointed Chief Technology Officer.
The company is currently collaborating with more than a dozen partners across a variety of cell types, with the goal of advancing ten therapies to the clinic over the next decade. Initial human trials are slated to begin in 2028.
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Disclosure: This article mentions clients of an Espacio portfolio company.