Immusoft has closed $2.7 million in Series A3 funding. The Seattle-based gene therapy startup developed technology that uses a patient’s immune cells to cure disease. It will use the funding to prepare for a new drug trial with the Food and Drug Administration.“The capital raised in this round will give us the resources we need to submit our Investigational New Drug application,” founder and CEO Matthew Scholz said in a news release. “We are grateful to our investors and for the speed in which we were able to close our latest effort to raise capital.”
If the body is driven more by information than by chemistry, why not treat disease with information? This question led Matthew Scholz to biology, and, ultimately, to Immusoft Corporation, a Seattle company he founded in 2009. Immusoft technology programs B cells, part of the body’s immune system, to treat disease. … By tweaking the code that tells the cells what to produce, Immusoft can make them into tiny treatment factories that continue to operate inside the body. In March, Immusoft acquired Minneapolis-based Discovery Genomics, which has a process that makes it far easier and cheaper to program the cells.
On March 8, one of the first companies we funded, Immusoft, announced it has acquired Discovery Genomics, Inc., bringing new expertise and technologies to its therapeutic platform. We asked Matthew Scholz, CEO, if he could share the story behind the acquisition and what it means for Immusoft going forward.
A Seattle biotech is working on technology that resembles the plot of Jurassic Park. Immusoft just acquired Minneapolis-based Discovery Genomics, a company that makes it possible for researchers to cut and paste DNA. The technology is called the Sleeping Beauty Transposon System. It gets its name from the process used to create it. … “In effect, they woke it up from an evolutionary sleep, which is how the name Sleeping Beauty became applied to it,” Immusoft CEO Matthew Scholz said. … Rather than making dinosaurs on a private island, though, Immusoft plans to make treatments for genetic diseases.
Immusoft, a Seattle-based biotech startup that has developed a way to manipulate human immune cells, today announced the acquisition of Discovery Genomics, a 16-year-old company based in Minneapolis, Minn. … Immusoft CEO Matthew Scholz said that his company acquired Discovery Genomics to gain its scientific expertise and key technology called the Sleeping Beauty Transposon System, which is used to deliver genes into cells to prevent or alleviate a disease state, all without using a virus. “Our two companies share a culture of innovation and a desire to change the way many diseases can be treated,” Scholz said in a statement. “It is my hope and expectation that combining our expertise and technology will help us in this pursuit.”
Immusoft has acquired Discovery Genomics…in a deal that expands the buyer’s technology holdings. With the acquisition, Immusoft has added to its portfolio Discovery Genomics’ Sleeping Beauty Transposon™ System, designed to deliver genes into cells using DNA rather than a virus. Immusoft said it plans to use the Sleeping Beauty Transposon System with its Immune System Programming (ISP™) technology platform. … Founded in 2000 and operational 2 years later, Discovery Genomics is based in Minneapolis. The company’s founders include Perry Hackett, Ph.D., whose lab invented the Sleeping Beauty Transposon System.
SEATTLE & MINNEAPOLIS–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Immusoft Corporation, a Seattle, Wash.-based gene therapy company, announced today it has purchased Minneapolis, Minn.-based Discovery Genomics, Inc. The acquisition brings to Immusoft renowned scientific expertise and key technology, the Sleeping Beauty Transposon System, which Discovery Genomics uses to deliver genes into cells without using a virus.
In 2008, Thiel made Founders Fund’s first substantial biotech investment…. Matthew Scholz … recruited biologists and bootstrapped Immusoft, which “programs” B cells–types of white blood cells that produce antibodies–to generate their own medicine. … Instead of injecting treatments into a patient, cells are extracted, rewired to produce a treatment, and then returned to the body. … [L]ong-lasting DNA therapies like Immusoft’s could become a giant thorn for pharma companies whose profits depend on eternal prescription refills. “Once we treat all their patients, they’re done,” says Scholz.
MPS I is a rare genetic disease that is incurable and lethal by age 12. Seattle-based Immusoft thinks it can harness a key part of the immune system to manufacture a missing enzyme needed to treat the disease. It represents a broader effort on the part of the company to develop a platform to treat a wide range of disease by turning immune system cells into drug factories.
For centuries, explorers have searched the world for the fountain of youth. Today’s billionaires believe they can create it, using technology and data.
