Cirina, a Hong Kong cancer diagnostics company, will merge with GRAIL, a Menlo Park startup, which is also developing non-invasive early-stage molecular cancer diagnostics. GRAIL is a spin-out from Illumina that has raised an impressive $1 billion in venture capital. The merger combines GRAIL’s deep pockets, which will fund large-scale clinical trials, with one of the scientific leaders in the field, Dennis Lo, DM, DPhil, a co-founder of Cirina. He is joined by other co-founders of Cirina, Rossa Chiu and Allen Chan at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and lead investor, Decheng Capital.
