" class="no-js "lang="en-US"> Seamless Therapeutics Launches with $12.5M Seed Financing
Saturday, December 14, 2024

Seamless Therapeutics Launches with $12.5M Seed Financing to Advance Transformative Gene Editing Platform

Seamless Therapeutics today announced a $12.5 million (€11.8M) seed financing round which will accelerate further development of its designer recombinases, a novel gene editing platform to transform the treatment of severe diseases. The company’s pioneering recombinase platform is able to program a widely used and established molecular biology tool to unlock the full potential of gene editing enabling the targeting of any site within the genome.

The seed round was co-led by Wellington Partners and Forbion and includes non-dilutive financing from BMBF GO-Bio, a prestigious German government initiative aimed at supporting the most innovative startups in the life sciences. Representatives from both Wellington and Forbion will join the company’s newly formed board of directors. The proceeds from the round will be used to further advance the company’s proprietary technology platform to build a pipeline of therapeutic candidates towards first-in-human readiness as well as to expand the company’s presence in the EU & US.

Seamless Therapeutics was founded based on ground-breaking discoveries from its scientific founders, Prof. Dr. Frank Buchholz, Dean of Research at the Faculty of Medicine and Head of Medical Systems Biology at the University Cancer Center of the Technische Universität Dresden, and Felix Lansing, PhD, Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Seamless Therapeutics. Both are pioneers in reprogramming recombinases. Felix Lansing, PhD, will be responsible for the continued development of the company’s proprietary technology.

“Our goal is to apply our deep understanding of recombinases to leverage their inherent benefits to repair genetic alterations that cause disease. We believe our pioneering technology will allow us to shatter the boundaries that exist in gene editing methods today,” said Anne-K. Heninger, PhD, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Seamless Therapeutics. “Both Wellington and Forbion are visionaries and highly experienced biotech investors, and we look forward to working closely with them in our efforts to transform the gene editing landscape.”

“Our modular platform has succeeded in reprogramming site-specific recombinases to any given target sequence effectively breaking the existing hurdles of leveraging this potential best-in-class gene editing system to treat human disease,” commented Felix Lansing, Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Seamless Therapeutics. “I look forward to working with our founding investors and our highly skilled team to apply our deep knowledge of recombinases to develop a pipeline of novel treatments.”

“We have entered a new era in drug discovery based on the promise of how precision gene editing can change the way we treat disease in the future. Seamless Therapeutics has a first-mover position with its innovative platform capable of modifying the long held standard recombination technology into a universal gene editing tool with unprecedented specificity. We are excited to support Seamless Therapeutics in its pursuit of taking a leadership position in the rapidly evolving gene editing arena,” added Karl Nägler, PhD, Managing Partner at Wellington Partners.

“At Forbion our philosophy is to seek out pioneering technologies early in their development and to enable founding teams to harness the true potential of their innovation. The team has developed a powerful new platform that has overcome key limitations of existing gene editing tools, such as CRISPR, prime & base editors,” said Dmitrij Hristodorov, PhD, Partner at Forbion.

Seamless Therapeutics’ platform has succeeded in reprogramming site specific recombinases to any given target sequence and make a range of specific changes including inversion, excision, exchange, and insertion from small to larger DNA fragments. Recombinases are a class of enzymes that have been widely used in scientific research for decades to precisely modify the genome of model organisms but until now could not be applied as a therapeutic due to their limited programmability to act on new target sites.

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