Six Companies Received Millions In Funding This Week
January 10, 2015
By Andrew Hoglund

Several companies raised millions of dollars to help either further develop or market their products this week. Cerus, CardioFocus, 23andMe, PureTech, GlySens, and Sera Prognostics all received funding, either through Series funding, through deals with other companies, or through fund raising of their own.

Cerus is in the process of raising $70 million through a public offering of 12.7 million shares at $5.50 a share. Cerus’s stock has jumped in the last couple weeks because of several FDA approvals for their Intercept Blood System to treat blood products. The system is designed to reduce the risk of infection, removing known and unknown pathogens.

23andMe has agreed to a $60 million deal with Genentech to provide the latter with genetic information on about 3,000 Parkinson’s patients. Genentech wants to use the information to help develop products for Parkinson’s patients. 23andMe will make $10 million upfront and could make up to $50 million more in milestone payments. The deal shows that companies are willing to pay quite the premium in order to obtain genetic information on the patients they help treat.

Meanwhile PureTech received $50 million from existing investors. PureTech invests money and time into healthcare technology companies to help them grow and commercialize their research. It currently has 12 pipeline programs and an additional three active sourcing initiatives that could get to that point. Each program is set up as an individual corporate entity where PureTech usually has a majority ownership.

And finally three companies raised money through Early Venture Round Funding. CardioFocus raised $32 million in a financing round and partnered with Japan Lifeline for an exclusive, multi-year distribution agreement in Japan. CardioFocus has the first catheter ablation system featuring an endoscope. GlySens raised $12 million through a Series C funding round. They plan to use the money to conduct a clinical trial for the second iteration of the receiver and implantable sensor for their continuous glucose monitoring system. And Sera Prognostics raised $20 million through a Series B funding round. They plan on using the money to develop their test for preterm birth prediction. They recently completed enrollment in their clinical study for the PreTRM test and hope to have results back by the end of 2015.

These six companies were able to raise quite a bit of money. Just this past week, they combined for over $240 million. These deals show that there is plenty of money out there to be made and all it takes is the right product pitch to win these investors over.