Bananas! These are the 4th most important food crop globally (and, frankly speaking, top 1 most important food crop to myself at breakfast). Now, Tropic Biosciences has been granted exemptions from regulation for their gene-edited non-browning Cavendish banana, in what constitutes the world’s first gene-edited banana cleared for commercial release by regulatory authorities. The Crick has secured £1 billion funding from the UK largest health bodies (MRC, Wellcome and Cancer Research UK) and, on top of producing world-class science, since its foundation in 2015 it has span out 10 startups, such as Artios Pharma, GammaDelta Therapuetics, or Achilles Therapeutics. In a 0 to 10 scale for being busy, Prof David Roblin’s schedule is (probably) an 11, as he has been appointed Chair of the Board at Centauri, and currently is CEO of Relation Therapeutics and non-executive director at Sosei Heptares. Tailor Bio has been granted £650,000 to look at the compatibility of their AI algorithm with the IlluminaTruSightTM Oncology, which has just been granted CE-IVD certification in Europe. Cancer Tech Accelerator is back, now with the support from Capital Enterprise, the Medical Research Council and Roche UK. Ascension VC has been named Seed VC of the Year and Parkwalk Advisors keeps being the UK’s most active investor in academic spinouts. Some scientific parks are on track to reach Net Zero (at least somebody is still on it) thanks to Pioneer Groupand Ray Valley Solar. And the elephant in the room: British biotech startups raised £730 million of venture capital funding during in the first half of this year… a figure that does not do very well in comparison to the £1.4 billion raised during the first half of 2021. Some want more pension funds to invest in VC. Thoughts? Thankfully, this week David Bowie remind us that we can be heroes (just for one day). Let’s dive in!

The Francis Crick Institute has secured £1 billion funding from some of the UK largest health bodies (the Medical Research Council (MRC), Cancer Research UK(CRUK) and the Wellcome Trust). In May, the Crick raised $50 million from the Chris Banton Foundation. Paul Nurse, director of Crick, said “The Government has recognised the need to expand research budgets, because our future relies on it.” while also acknowledging “It is critical to maintain our current powerful links with scientists in Europe.” The Crick has span out 10 companies since inception in 2015: Achilles Therapeutics (personalised approach to cancer therapy by targeting cell surface markers that are specific to each patient), Adendra Therapeutics (modulating dendritic and other related cells in order to fine-tune their immunological control of cancer), Artios Pharma (new treatments that target DNA repair pathway vulnerabilities), Enara Bio (cancer-specific vaccines and other immunotherapies), GammaDelta Therapeutics (exploit the unique activities of gamma delta (γδ) T cells), Metacognis (AI-powered map of research literature to help scientists navigate the ever-increasing number of scientific papers), Myricx Pharma (drug discovery company investigating N-myristoyltransferase role in cancer), Adaptate Biotherapeutics (modulating γδ T-cell activity using therapeutic antibodies), Paradromics (next generation brain-computer interface technology) and mPixl (non-invasive image-based AI algorithms). According to a commissioned report from the Cancer Research UK, for every £1 spent on Cancer Research UK-funded research in the UK in 2020/21, £2.80 of benefit was generated for the UK economy.

Cambridge-based Tailor Bio has been awarded £650,000 Innovate UK Biomedical Catalyst Award. The startup has partnered with the University of Cambridge and Illumina, as Tailor Bio graduated from the first funding cycle of Illumina Accelerator Cambridge. The proceedings of the award will be used to develop the first first diagnostic test to predict doxorubicin response in patients with high-grade ovarian cancer. Doxorubicin is a common chemotherapy drug for ovarian cancer in UK but approximately 50% of the patients do not respond well to the therapy, leading to potential side effects and generating costs due to ineffective treatment. This project seeks to evaluate the compatibility of Tailor Bio’s proprietary technology with the Illumina TruSightTM Oncology (TSO) Comprehensive (EU) assay, which is being implemented across the NHS and has recently been granted CE-IVD certification in Europe.

Healt-tech startup Oto has raised $3.3 million seed funding. The round was led by Octopus Ventures and follows a £510,000 pre-seed round from Y Combinator early this year. Oto is developing digital solutions to help with tinnitus, a chronic condition that causes persistent ringing or buzzing sound coming from within the ears.The company was cofounded in 2019 by Dr Ed Farrar and Dr George Leidig, who lives with tinnitus.

UK tech companies have raised more venture capital funding in the first five months of 2022 than in the whole of 2020, and yet this is happening despite of the biotech sector. The £12.4 billion in funding raised this year puts the UK second only to the US in terms of start-up investment, and ahead of the likes of China, France and India. However, looking in particular at the British biotech and life sciences sector, it raised £450 million between March and May 2022, £31 million less than during the first quarter. Breaking these figures down: £277 million in venture capital funding (-39% in 2022/Q1), £173 in public follow-on financings (+4,666% (!) in 2022/Q1), and £4.5 million in initial public offerings (IPOs) (-81% in 2022/Q1). Looking at the first half of the year, UK biotechs attracted £730 million of venture capital funding during in the first half of this year, compared to £1.4 billion raised in 2021. The fall in venture investment is a concern for the sector as NASDAQ downturn is now permeating to private markets. The situation in the British public market is no better: life science companies raised £28 million in listings in the current first half of the year, compared to £646 million last year. For US-based biotech, venture capital investment decreased by 46% during the first quarter of 2022.

Cancer Tech Accelerator is open for applications. The program is backed by Capital Enterprise, the Medical Research Council (MRC) and Roche UK. 6 teams will be awarded £70,000 of non-dilutive grant funding (may include a salary stipend) to enable for 6-month experimental concept validation. Mentoring and business support as well as additional support from Roche UK and Cancer Research UK (CRUK) is included too. Deadline: 15th September. First cohort finalists include OrganA (hyper-realistic organ mimics to train the next generation of surgeons and medical robots), Elaitra(state-of-the-art neural networks to detect breast cancer), and Turing Biosystems (AI platform capable of relating clinical or biological data from different sources to discover novel insights), among others.

The Alzheimer’s Society, Innovate UK and the Medical Research Council (MRC) have announced a new £4.1 million Longitude Prize on Dementia launching in September 2022. The funding includes £3.1 million in seed funding and grants to the most promising innovators and £1 million prize to the winner of the Longitude Prize on Dementia in 2026. The award includes wider support including access to data, advice on product design.

Parkwalk Advisors, the UK’s most active investor in academic spinouts. Parkwalk was founded in 2009 by Moray Wright (CEO) and Alastair Kilgour (CIO) and is part of London-based intellectual property business IP Group (LON: IPO). The firm invests up to £20 million into a single company, and so far has invested £362 million in over 150 companies. Parkwalk also manages the University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, University of Bristol and Imperial College’s investment funds.

Tropic Biosciences has been granted exemptions from regulation for their gene-edited non-browning Cavendish banana from the U.S. Department of Agriculture(USDA) and the Honduran Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock (SAG). This is a significant milestone as it constitutes the world’s first gene-edited banana cleared for commercial release by regulatory authorities.

The University of Cambridge and Royal Papworth Hospital Charity have inaugurated the Heart and Lung Research Institute (HLRI). HLRI has secured £30 million from the UK Research Partnership Investment Fund, £10 million from the British Heart Foundation (BHF) – one of theBHF’s largest ever strategic awards – as well as additional funding from the University’s contribution to the partnership, the Wolfson Foundation, the Royal Papworth Hospital Charity and the Cystic Fibrosis Trust. HLRI will host more than 380 staff from the partner institutions and is led by Dr Mark Toshner, Royal Papworth consultant, specialist in pulmonary hypertension and Associate Professor at the University of Cambridge.

Cambridge (UK), Montreal (CA)-based BIOS Health has been awarded $100,000 from Phase 1 of the Neuromod Prize. The prize is a Stimulating Peripheral Activity to Relieve Conditions (SPARC) initiative from the US National Institutes of Health Common Fund. The competition rewards the development of neuromodulation solutions that can independently regulate two or more desired autonomic functions without unintended effects. The prize pool totals $4 million (Phase 2). BIOS is pioneering AI-driven neural therapeutics for chronic disease. Their lead project involves stimulating vagus nerve while recording from nearby neural and physiological tissues, thus optimising stimulations. BIOS’ neural code is built on the world’s largest proprietary neural data set and is already used in the clinic. The company was co-founded by University of Cambridge graduates Emil Hewage (CEO, computational neuroscientist) and Oliver Armitage (CSO, biomechanical engineer).

Elasmogen and the University of Aberdeen have been graded Outstanding (A) for their Knowledge Transfer Partnership co-funded by Innovate UK and Scottish Funding Council. The certificate of Excellence has been awarded in the context of their ongoing collaboration for design, developing and testing novel bi-specific drugs for liver disease.

Constructive Bio is recruiting Associate Scientists (Genome Assembly & Genome Engineering), a Bioinformatician, and a Facilities and Operations Lead.

Nottingham-based drug discovery CRO Sygnature Discovery has been recognisedas one of the Britain's fastest growing private companies. Since 2011, 40 compounds, discovered by Sygnature for partners, have entered pre-clinical development and 20 of these have progressed to clinical trials (Phases I, II and III). Sygnature recently acquired Peak Proteins (April, 2022) and is backed by Five Arrows Capital Partners (Rothschild & Co) and Phoenix Equity Partners among others.

Ascension has been named Seed VC of the Year by the UK Business Angels Association. Ascension manages (S)EIS and Institutional Seed funds investing across seven key focus areas: Digital Health & Life Sciences, DeepTech, Sustainability, FinTech, Commerce, Next Gen Media and New Work. They have invested in AMLO Biosciences, Epoch Biodesign, Novai and Qureight, among others. Since 2015, Ascension has invested in 150+ start-ups and has over £70m under management.

London-based Centauri Therapeutics has appointed Dr Jennifer Schneider as Chief Executive Officer (CEO). In addition, Dr Helen Bright has joined as Vice President of Research & Development, and Professor David Roblin FRCP FMedSci as Chair of the Board of Directors. Centauri is an immunotherapy company focused on the treatment of infectious diseases. Dr Schneider has 20 years of leadership experience and previously was CEO for the Global Antibiotic Research & Development Partnership (GARDP). Dr Bright joins as VP of R&D from Medicines Discovery Catapult and has over 30 years’ experience focused on infectious diseases within the biopharmaceutical industry (ex-AstraZeneca, ex-GSK, ex-Pfizer). Prof Roblin has held senior leadership positions for over 20 years at Bayer and Pfizer. He is Chair of Scientific Translation at the Francis Crick Institute, Non-executive Director of Sosei Heptares and has recently been appointed as CEO of Relation Therapeutics.

Oxford-based Spy Biotech has appointed Mark Leuchtenberger as its Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and joins the Board of Directors. Sumi Biswas (Co-founder) has been appointed as Chief Scientific Officer (CSO). Leuchtenberger has held leadership positions at Aleta Biotherapeutics (Executive Chairman), Brooklyn ImmunoTherapeutics (CEO), and IRX Therapeutics (Chairman, President and CEO). SpyBiotech is developing its first proprietary SpyTag/SpyCatcher protein superglue enabled VLP-based vaccine candidate targeting human cytomegalovirus (HCMV). The company was founded in 2017 and, in 2021, raised $32.5 million Series. Sumi Biswas has been the company’s CEO since inception and she has led scientific and strategic development during this period. Now, Biswas will continue as President and CSO.

Chesterford Reserach Park has welcomed Healx to the Park’s Science Village. Healx is taking more than 3,500 sq ft of lab and office space. The Park is owned by Aviva Investors and the Uttlesford District Council. Healx is currently recruiting for cell biologists, bioscientists and high content imaging specialists.

Bicycle Therapeutics (NASDAQ: BCYC) and Genentech to expand collaboration for developing Bicycle-based immuno-oncology therapies. Following the terms from an existing agreement (February 2020), Genentech was granted two collaboration expansion options, giving the right to add two additional programs in exchange for $10 million to Bicycle. Both expansions (previous one in October 2021) include discovery and pre-clinical development of Bicycle-based immunotherapies against multiple oncology targets excluding Bicycle’s wholly owned oncology pipeline.

Bivictrix Therapeutics (AIM: BVX) has reported significant progress towards development of lead candidate nomination for BVX001. The company has gain understanding of the optimum range of target binding affinities for lead declaration and is clearing the path to Investigational New Drug (IND) status. In addition, Bivictrix has filed further UK patent application for BVX001, thus reinforcing its IP position. BVX001 is a pre-clincal bi-specific antibody-drug conjugate leveraging Bi-Cygni ADC, Bivictrix’s proprietary technology. It targets CD7 and CD33 and it is designed as a treatment for Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) and other blood cancers.

According to Dealroom and The Economist, “Britain’s once-mighty stockmarket has drifted into insignificance. In 2006 it accounted for 18% of the equity capital raised in global initial public offerings. This year it has raised under 1%.” This article asksGovernment to dilute the pension-fee cap that crimps investment in early-stage firms, arguing top priority would be to direct the £4.6trn of assets held in British pension and insurance funds into more productive areas.

Enterprise Investment Scheme in (EIS) may be coming to an end after April 2025. Moray Wight (CEO, Parkwalk Advisors) has written an illustrative piece on the impact of these schemes on the UK’s innovative tech ecosystem.

Current market landscape leaves institutional LPs with a difficult choice on how to deploy capital. Marc Schröder (co-founder and managing partner of Maschmeyer Group Ventures) has written a LP-oriented piece on why it is time to invest in early-stage venture capital funds.

Montgomery Summit 2022 - The evolution of VC: What’s next? Maureen Austin(Managing Partner, Cambridge Associates) hosts a conversation between Jesse Draper (General Partner, Halogen Ventures), Rana Yared (Partner, Balderton Capital), and Laura Chau (Partner, Canaan Partners).

Pioneer Group, developer and operator of life science and technology campuses, is set to become the first science parks in the UK to report Zero Scope 2 carbon emissions. Pioneer has signed a Corporate Power Purchase Agreement (CPPA) with Ray Valley Solar, the largest community-owned ground mount solar park in the UK (Oxfordshire). Hexagon Tower(Manchester), BioCity Glasgow, Colworth Science Park (Bedford) and Edinburgh Technopole will benefit from the CPPA.