NEW YORK – Depixus, a French nucleic acid analysis firm, said on Wednesday that it has raised €30.6 million ($34.5 million) in Series A financing.
Lansdowne Partners and the PSIM Fund — operated by Bpifrance on behalf of the French government — led the round, joined by Casdin Capital and existing investors, including Arix Bioscience.
The funds will be used to develop Depixus' Magna instrument, workflows, and reagents. The platform captures native DNA and RNA on a flow cell and assays it for base modifications, molecular structure, and interactions with other molecules.
The Ecole Normale Supérieure spinout, which is based in Paris and Cambridge, UK, said the new round brings the equity and grant funding it has raised to date to over €41 million.
"We are extremely excited by the power of our Magna technology to overcome the current challenges of base modification sequencing and RNA structural analysis," Depixus cofounder and CEO Gordon Hamilton said in a statement, noting that the technology could have applications in biomarker discovery for liquid biopsy cancer detection, virology, and the development of RNA-targeting drugs.
"Thanks to the support from our new and existing investors, we will continue to recruit additional top talent in France and the UK to further develop the platform through to commercial launch and beyond," he said.