NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – DiaCarta today announced it raised $8 million in a Series A financing round.Â
Proceeds will go toward commercialization of its products and the expansion of its portfolio, it said, adding the financing came from BioVeda China Fund. In conjunction with BVCF's financing, Weixin Xu, a principal at the venture capital fund, will join DiaCarta's board.
Based in Hayward, Calif., DiaCarta calls itself a translational genomics and molecular diagnostics firm that has CE-IVD assays for detecting EGFR, KRAS, NRAS, BRAF, PIK3CA, and JAK-2 mutations. Its QClamp mutation detection assays use a novel xeno-nucleic acid clamping technology to suppress amplification of wild-type DNA, enabling researchers to selectively amplify mutant DNA with real-time PCR.
According to the company, the technology can detect mutant DNA present at less than .1 percent, and its sensitivity and specificity make QClamp superior to next-generation sequencing and droplet digital PCR.
In addition to CE-IVD marking, its assays have been cleared by the Chinese Food and Drug Administration, DiaCarta said.