Seattle-based biotech startup Lumen Bioscience raised a $30 million Collection C extension and introduced a number of management updates.
WestRiver Group led the newest funding spherical, bringing the corporate’s whole capital raised to $186.8 million.
The brand new funding will assist Lumen speed up its pipeline of orally delivered biologic medicine produced from genetically engineered spirulina, a sort of blue-green algae.
Lumen’s expertise platform permits therapeutic proteins — historically injected or infused — to be produced and delivered orally in an edible, low-cost kind.
The 110-person firm is concentrating on illnesses that act in or originate from the gastrointestinal tract. It just lately reported promising Section 2 outcomes from LMN-201, Lumen’s lead candidate for recurrent C. difficile an infection.
The corporate additionally introduced that Jeff Raikes, former Microsoft president and Gates Basis CEO, joined Lumen’s board as an unbiased director.
Different personnel updates:
- Erik Anderson, founder and CEO of WestRiver Group, was elected vice chairman of the board.
- Inner promotions embrace Nhi Khuong to EVP and Kole Krieger to SVP, whereas Dr. David Saunders, a retired U.S. Military colonel and scientific trialist, joined the scientific improvement crew.
The corporate has grown its workforce by almost 40% since 2023 and opened a second manufacturing facility.
Lumen is led by CEO Brian Finrow, a former senior vp at Adaptive Biotechnologies, and Chief Science Officer Jim Roberts, the previous head of fundamental sciences on the Fred Hutchinson Most cancers Analysis Institute. They co-founded the startup in 2017.
