Precision Chroma Closes US$7.3M Seed Funding to Advance Next-Gen Chromatography
Precision Chroma raises US$7.3 million Seed round led by M Ventures to advance next-generation chromatography for direct purification from bioreactors
Funding will support commercial launch of Precision Chroma’s research and process development products, scale-up and progression towards GMP manufacturing applications.
M Ventures leads the financing, with strong continued support from founding investor Bridgewest Ventures and participation from new investors Icehouse Ventures and Aspire NZ Seed Fund.
Precision Chroma, a New Zealand biotechnology company developing a new generation of chromatography technology for biopharmaceutical purification, today announced the closing of a US$7.3 million Seed financing round.
The financing was led by M Ventures, the strategic corporate venture capital arm of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, with strong continued support from founding investor Bridgewest Ventures, and participation from new investors Icehouse Ventures and Aspire NZ Seed Fund.
Precision Chroma will use the new capital to scale its proprietary chromatography manufacturing platform, launch its first products for research and process-development applications, expand its team and deepen collaborations with biopharmaceutical manufacturers. The financing will also support development of larger-format columns and the company’s longer-term path towards GMP manufacturing applications.
In conventional biologics manufacturing, bioreactor harvest is typically clarified by centrifugation and depth filtration before Protein A chromatography, adding unit operations, consumables, equipment and potential product loss.
Precision Chroma replaces randomly packed beads with highly ordered agarose packed-bed structures using advanced 3D-printing techniques. Its macroporous architecture is designed to allow cells and debris to pass through while therapeutic proteins bind with familiar separation principles, enabling direct affinity capture from unclarified bioreactor harvest and potentially eliminating clarification steps.
Importantly, the technology is designed to operate using existing chromatography systems, familiar affinity chemistry and conventional process conditions, minimizing the operational change for adoption, while enabling a fundamentally different purification workflow.
Dr. Oliver Hardick, Investment Director at M Ventures, commented:
“Downstream purification has struggled to keep pace with the gains in upstream bioprocess productivity. Precision Chroma addresses this by re-engineering the chromatography bed while retaining the agarose chemistry, ligands, systems and operating principles bioprocess engineers already know. We are acutely aware of the adoption challenges associated with novel chromatography technologies, however the potential to capture product directly from the bioreactor, while minimising the change required for adoption, is particularly compelling. We are excited to lead this financing and partner with Sean and the team through the company’s next phase.”
Sean Feast, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Precision Chroma, said:
“Downstream processing remains a constraint on biologics manufacturing efficiency. We founded Precision Chroma to redesign chromatography around that problem. This financing enables us to launch products for researchers and process-development scientists, scale into larger formats and work with biopharmaceutical partners towards manufacturing applications. We are delighted to welcome M Ventures, Icehouse Ventures and Aspire NZ Seed Fund alongside the continued support of Bridgewest Ventures.”
Saum Vahdat, Chief Executive Officer of Bridgewest Ventures, commented:
“Together we have taken an idea from the University of Canterbury and built it into a commercially relevant bioprocessing platform with genuine global interest and potential. The speed with which the company has scaled the technology and demonstrated performance underlines how disruptive this platform can be in separations and chromatography. We are proud to have backed the company from launch and welcome the new investors as it enters its next phase.”
About Precision Chroma
Precision Chroma is a Christchurch, New Zealand-based biotechnology company developing next-generation chromatography technology for biopharmaceutical research, development and manufacturing.
Its engineered agarose packed-bed structures are designed to enable high-performance purification from complex feed streams, including direct capture of therapeutic proteins from unclarified bioreactor harvest. The company was founded from technology developed at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand.
For more information, visit www.precision-chroma.com.
About M Ventures
M Ventures is the strategic corporate venture capital fund of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany. From its headquarters in the Netherlands and offices in Germany, the USA and Israel, M Ventures invests globally in transformational ideas driven by innovative entrepreneurs in the areas of Healthcare drug development, Life Science tools, Electronics and Frontier Technology & Sustainability.
Taking an active role in its portfolio companies, M Ventures teams up with management teams and co-investors to translate scientific discoveries into commercial success. M Ventures focuses on identifying and financing novel solutions to some of the most difficult challenges through company creation and equity investments in fields that will impact the vitality and sustainability of Merck’s current and future businesses.
For more information, visit www.m-ventures.com.
About Bridgewest Ventures
Bridgewest Ventures is the venture capital platform of Bridgewest Group, focused on building globally competitive companies originating from New Zealand and international research ecosystems. Bridgewest Ventures combines institutional investment capability, operational expertise, and international commercial networks to help emerging companies scale globally.
Bridgewest Group is an innovative and privately held global investment firm with over $3B in private capital. Founded in 1999, the global firm has earned a long-standing reputation for creating and scaling transformational businesses to achieve outsized success. Bridgewest Group leverages its expertise and global eco-community in key sectors where it can have the greatest impact including
Life Sciences, Software, Semiconductor and Artificial Intelligence/Deep Tech. Bridgewest Group is based in the US, with investments primarily in the US, Europe, China, Australasia, and India.
About Icehouse Ventures
Icehouse Ventures is a venture capital firm with a mission to be transformative investors in transformative Kiwi companies.
Over the last 20 years, they have scaled to become New Zealand’s most active venture investor, with more than $900m invested into 400+ companies. Icehouse Ventures has been among the earliest investors in Halter, Sharesies, Tracksuit, Crimson Education, and Dawn Aerospace.
About Aspire NZ Seed Fund Limited
New Zealand Growth Capital Partners (NZGCP) was established by the New Zealand Government in 2002 to build a vibrant early-stage technology investment market in New Zealand.
NZGCP operates two investment vehicles; Aspire NZ Seed Fund and Elevate NZ Venture Fund which are funds designed to stimulate private investment into this space through a fund-of-funds and co- investment model.
Media enquiries:
Precision Chroma (CEO)
Dr Sean Feast
enquires@precision-chroma.com