Bluepha Completes Pre-A Round, Angel Investor FreeS Fund Continues to Follow On | FreeS Fund Investment News

Bluepha recently announced the completion of a RMB 10 million Pre-A funding round, with FreeS Fund, the lead investor from its angel round, participating again. The proceeds will be used to expand production lines and build an automated microbial synthetic biology technology platform.

Founded in October 2016 on the campus of Tsinghua University by Dr. Li Teng, Dr. Zhang Haoqian, and Professor Chen Guoqiang of Tsinghua, Bluepha completed its angel round in early 2017, led by FreeS Fund with participation from TusStar and Taiyou Fund. The company has already achieved small-scale mass production of PHA, a biodegradable material. Going forward, Bluepha plans to broaden its scope and develop a range of bio-manufactured products for medical, environmental, and consumer applications.

From the Investors

Rui Ma, Early-Stage Project Lead, FreeS Fund

Email: marui@freesvc.com

The ability to rationally design biology will bring breakthroughs, technological iterations, and commercial opportunities beyond imagination. While we are not yet able to achieve fully rational design, the level of technology available today has already given rise to numerous promising companies in the US and Europe in areas such as the microbiome, natural product synthesis, cancer therapy, viral vaccines, biosensing, and medical diagnostics.

Our decision to invest in Bluepha in early 2017 was based on the belief that domestic synthetic biology was just getting started, and we were bullish on young teams with solid theoretical frameworks in synthetic biology and deep biotech expertise, encouraging them to double down on technology. Once such a company establishes a technical moat, it becomes exceedingly difficult to surpass. Over the past year, Bluepha has made tremendous progress across three dimensions: transitioning from academia to a corporate structure, developing commercial applications based on its technology platform, and advancing industrialization around specific use cases.

The company has sequentially solved multiple challenges from strain design to production and purification, completed continuous pilot production of PHA in a 5-ton fermenter, achieved initial mass production, and secured sales. It has also introduced and developed novel high-efficiency strains, into which it has adapted various genetic components, CRISPR editing tools, and pathway assembly tools. Additionally, the company has essentially completed R&D on two products beyond PHA — a food additive and a pharmaceutical precursor — providing initial proof of the enormous potential of its synthetic biology platform and toolkit. We believe Bluepha has tremendous potential in both synthetic biology and bio-manufacturing going forward.

Synthetic biology company Bluepha announced the completion of a RMB 10 million Pre-A funding round, led by Leaguer Venture Capital with continued participation from FreeS Fund, the angel round investor. The proceeds will be used to expand production lines and build an automated microbial synthetic biology technology platform.

In response to the rapid global growth of the biodegradable materials industry, Bluepha uses synthetic biology technology, genetic data, and automation platforms to design customized microorganisms, reducing the biosynthesis cost of PHA (polyhydroxyalkanoates) to address the environmental and health problems caused by plastic pollution.

Following its announcement in December 2017 that it had completed pilot production of PHA, the company has achieved small-scale mass production with cost control and process capabilities reaching globally leading levels, and has established extensive partnerships across the industry. Once a production line with annual capacity of thousands of tons is completed and brought online, costs will decrease further.

Starting with PHA, Bluepha has achieved vertical integration across the industrial microorganism value chain from microscopic cell design to macroscopic product manufacturing, and has built continuous technological iteration and product development capabilities. Going forward, it will further expand into developing a variety of bio-manufactured products to meet medical, environmental, and consumer needs, such as materials, natural fragrances, microbial agents, and anti-cancer drugs.

In early 2018, the company established and launched an R&D center in Shenzhen. Following this funding round, the company will focus on building an automated microbial synthetic biology technology platform at its Shenzhen R&D center, leveraging synthetic biology and automatic control technology to enable data-driven rapid microbial screening, gene editing, and testing processes, significantly accelerating the pace of microbial technology and product development.

Li Teng, co-founder and CEO of Bluepha, said: "In recent years, multiple scientific discoveries about microorganisms have revealed the enormous, little-known value of these tiny life forms. These discoveries have astonished humanity and driven rapid growth in the microbial industry. However, we realize that the value of microorganisms remains far from fully exploited. Bluepha's mission is to fully unlock this value and develop microbial products to solve the world's existing problems. Plastic pollution stands out as one of the most pressing issues facing the world today. Leaguer Venture Capital and FreeS Fund are investors who deeply identify with Bluepha's vision, and we all firmly believe that fulfilling this mission will create Bluepha's value."

Zhang Haoqian, co-founder and CTO of Bluepha, said: "Microorganisms can efficiently synthesize various chemical small molecules and biological macromolecules under natural, mild conditions. However, how to harness this manufacturing capability for human use has long been a challenge in biotechnology. With this in mind, starting from PHA biosynthesis, we have applied synthetic biology technology to microorganisms and, for the first time in China, achieved full-chain integration from microscopic cell design to macroscopic product manufacturing. Going forward, beyond continuing to establish and solidify PHA as a solution to white pollution, we will continuously create more microorganisms to more fully satisfy people's aspirations for a better life. This is the future that Bluepha has always looked forward to."