NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Startup SeqLL has closed a $1 million Series A financing round, which it said it will use to enhance Helicos BioSciences' single-molecule sequencing technology for scientific and diagnostic applications. Genomic Diagnostic Technologies led the investment.
Helicos filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in November 2012. In March 2013, it sought approval from the bankruptcy court to sell its assets, including its sequencers and reagents, to Daniel Jones, who had been a field application scientist and bioinformatics analyst at Helicos. At the time, Jones said he was also seeking a non-exclusive license from Helicos to build a new entity that would perform sequencing services.
Jones founded SeqLL in March 2013 to offer sequencing services on the HeliScope.
"This round of investment allows SeqLL to sustain and enhance the [single-molecule sequencing] technology with the potential to increase read lengths and revolutionize the HeliScope platform," Jones, who is also president of SeqLL, said in a statement. "We are excited to build SeqLL into the premier scientific platform for transcriptome investigation and the sequencing of low-quantity samples."
Currently, SeqLL offers direct RNA sequencing, RNA-seq and data analysis, and DNA sequencing services on the HeliScope.