Cambridge, UK - 19 February 2008 – Population Genetics Technologies Limited (‘PGT’), a privately-held company focused on creating new paradigms for performing large-scale population genetics studies, today announced that it has raised £3.8 million in a first round of venture funding. The venture financing was provided by Auriga Partners, Noble Fund Managers, and Compass Genetics Investors LLC (the founders of PGT: Drs. Sydney Brenner, Sam Eletr and Philip Goelet).
The company today also announced the appointment of Dr. Mel N. Kronick as chief executive officer and member of the board of directors of PGT. Dr. Kronick was former division R&D manager at both Agilent Technologies and Applied Biosystems. In these previous positions Dr. Kronick was responsible for multiple product development activities that have resulted in commercially successful products using DNA sequencing and DNA microarray technologies. For the last 18 months he has worked closely with PGT management to refine PGT’s business focus and then to organise this Series A funding.
Joining Dr. Kronick on the PGT board are Dr. Bernard Daugeras, Managing Partner of Auriga Partners, and Dr. Stephane Mery, Director, Healthcare Investments, at Noble Fund Managers. Dr. Sam Eletr, former acting CEO of PGT, will now serve as board chairman: Dr Eletr was founder of Applied Biosystems (the company that developed the first and most successful DNA sequencing machines) and Lynx Therapeutics (the company that pioneered the genesis of the emerging next generation sequencing technologies). Dr. Mark Treherne, a former research executive at Pfizer, who has founded several UK biotechnology companies and served as chairman of the PGT board until now, will remain on the board.
PGT was started in 2005 with seed funding from the Wellcome Trust’s Technology Transfer Division to develop and then commercialise several novel concepts for studying populations that were proposed by Dr. Sydney Brenner, co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2002. Dr. Brenner has noted that “this new technology will enable users to discover shared gene variants characteristic of a particular disorder or a specific response to drugs without the need to sequence separately every individual genome in a particular population.” Dr Sam Eletr recently observed: “Advances in technologies designed to obtain DNA sequence information are moving at a significant pace. Our new method, if successful, will be a huge leap forward, as it is expected to reduce significantly the cost of using any sequencing technology, however efficient, that can analyze only one genome at a time.”
Auriga Partners ( http://www.aurigapartners.com ) is an independent venture capital firm based in Paris, France. It invests in innovative, high-potential ventures in information and communication technology and life science at the seed or early development stage in Europe, North America and Israel. Auriga Partners manages three funds totaling over €330 million. As well as investing the necessary capital, Auriga Partners also provides its portfolio companies with its know-how in developing and solidifying executive teams, structuring companies, broadening their networks and forming strategic and corporate alliances. Noble Fund Managers ( http://www.noblegp.com/nfm ) based in London, UK, manages several VCT Funds and a Venture Debts Fund. One of its funds, Noble Health Fund VCT, is dedicated to healthcare.
The Wellcome Trust ( http://www.wellcome.ac.uk ) is the largest charity in the UK. It funds innovative biomedical research, in the UK and internationally, spending around £650 million each year to support the brightest scientists with the best ideas. The Wellcome Trust supports public debate about biomedical research and its impact on health and wellbeing.
