Martinsried, Germany, November 20, 2009 / b3c newswire / - KINAXO Biotechnologies GmbH announces the completion of a financing round, gaining two new investors in the company, Leifina and Conmit Invest. At the same time KINAXO reports that Jürgen Schumacher has been elected as a new member of the company’s advisory board.
KINAXO shareholders Axel Ullrich, Hellmut Kirchner, Manfred Ferber as well as the company’s institutional investors Mountain Partners, BioM, High-Tech Gründerfonds, the Max-Planck Society and the KfW ERP Start-Fonds also participated in this financing round. KINAXO will use the funds to develop novel biomarkers that allow stratification of cancer patients receiving targeted therapies.
KINAXO’s CEO and co-founder Andreas Jenne said: “There is little doubt that biomarkers will be one of the major drivers of pharmaceutical research and development in the 21st Century. Biomarkers have the potential to improve R&D efficiency and clinical success rates, save public health costs, and gain pharmaceutical companies a valuable advantage over their competitors. Following this trend we will make significant investments over the next few years to expand our phosphoproteomics services PhosphoScout® and develop a novel class of biomarkers that help improve cancer therapies.”
Horst Domdey, CEO of BioM, commented: “KINAXO is in the right place at the right time. Today, biomarkers are more and more in demand to improve treatment options. With its unique phosphoproteomics platform that goes way beyond existing technologies, KINAXO is very well positioned in this rapidly growing market. Moreover, KINAXO’s recent partnerships with Bayer and Roche underpin the industry’s readiness to implement novel technologies turning personalized medicine into reality.”
About KINAXO Biotechnologies GmbH
KINAXO is a privately-held biotechnology company based in Munich/Martinsried, Germany. KINAXO offers a unique technology tool box for drug mode-of-action analysis, cellular target profiling, target deconvolution, drug repositioning and biomarker identification. KINAXO maintains several collaborations with leading pharmaceutical companies, such as Bayer, Roche, Boehringer Ingelheim and Johnson & Johnson.
About KINAXO’s PhosphoScout® service
PhosphoScout® is a quantitative phosphoproteomics service developed to investigate cellular signal transduction pathways and their response to drug treatment. It allows annotation and quantification of regulated phosphorylation sites in living cells, animal models and patient samples. Using state-of-the-art quantitative mass spectrometry up to 15,000 phosphorylation changes can be monitored in a single experiment, allowing system-wide modeling of cellular signaling events. Unlike immunoassays, PhosphoScout® does not require antibodies for detection and thus enables unbiased phosphoproteome analyses across signaling pathways on a global scale.
About Leifina GmbH
Leifina is a diversified investment holding company managed by its founder Dr. Kurt Schwarz who held positions at Harvard Medical School, the Massachusetts General Hospital and Merck Sharp & Dohme. From 1990 to 2006 he was a member of the supervisory board of Schwarz Pharma. As a prominent private investor Schwarz is engaged in various biotechnology companies and private equity funds.
About Conmit Invest GmbH
Conmit invests in companies with exceptional prospects and outstanding management. Managing founder Hans-Milo Halhuber played a leading role in developing the German health care service market. From 1999 to 2009 Halhuber was Chairman of CURANUM, which under his leadership became Germany’s biggest listed health care service company. As a serial entrepreneur Halhuber is actively involved in more than 20 companies.
About Dr. Jürgen Schumacher
Jürgen Schumacher is an internationally recognized German entrepreneur. He is a co-founder of Qiagen and principal founder of NewLab Bioquality, which he sold to Charles River Laboratories International in 2008. Besides being involved in several industry associations and other organizations, Schumacher is an experienced business angel who holds management and board positions in a number of biotechnology companies.
