Boston’s Ginkgo Bioworks has announced it will acquire California biotech Zymergen in an all-stock transaction that values Zymergen at an approximately $300 million market capitalization. The transaction is expected to be completed by the first quarter of 2023. Ginkgo’s platform is enabling biotechnology applications across diverse markets, from food and agriculture to industrial chemicals to […]

Proving that it’s not just the summer weather that’s hot, local biopharms continue to attract millions in funding. Case in point, Cambridge-based CAMP4 Therapeutics recently closed a $100 million Series B round to advance its lead regRNA (regulatory RNA) programs. regRNAs are considered to be part of the “dark side of the genome,” the 98% […]

London-based artificial intelligence lab DeepMind Technologies and the European Bioinformatics Institute of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL-EBI) have predicted the three-dimensional structures of nearly all proteins known to science and made the information freely and openly available to the scientific community via the AlphaFold protein structure database. The database is being expanded approximately 200 […]

In spite of the summer doldrums, local startups continue to attract funding. Cambridge-based immuno-oncology company DEM BioPharma recently launched with $70 million in financing. The company is pioneering immunotherapeutics designed to unleash macrophages and other myeloid effector cells to eliminate tumors by targeting novel ‘don’t eat me’ (DEM) and ‘eat me’ (EM) signals on cancer […]

Boston-based, biotech-focused venture capital firm Third Rock Ventures has raised $1.1 billion for its new Fund VI. Third Rock employs a hands-on approach to partnering with founders to build companies and provides early and rigorous integration of science, medicine, business and strategy to build successful companies. To date, Third Rock has raised $3.8 billion and […]

Takeda has signed a 15-year lease with BioMed Realty for approximately 600,000 square feet of R&D and office space to be built at 585 Third Street in Kendall Square. The state-of-the-art facility will allow Takeda, the largest life sciences employer in Massachusetts, to create a purpose-built R&D facility with laboratories featuring modern design elements and upgraded […]

Bayer AG has opened its new Research and Innovation Center at Kendall Square, expanding further the company’s footprint into one of the world’s most innovative pharmaceutical R&D hubs. Representing a total $140M investment into the area, Bayer’s 62,100-square-foot building houses a new center of precision molecular oncology research equipped with state-of-the-art laboratories and offices for […]

In April Boston-based Ginkgo Bioworks announced plans to significantly expand its platform capabilities in agricultural biologicals through a partnership with German conglomerate Bayer AG in which Ginkgo will acquire Bayer’s 175,000-square-foot West Sacramento Biologics R&D site, team, and internal discovery and lead optimization platform. In addition, Ginkgo will integrate the R&D platform assets from Joyn […]

Flagship Pioneering has unveiled ProFound Therapeutics, a company founded at Flagship Labs in 2020. The company’s ProFoundry Platform has uncovered tens of thousands of novel proteins, remapping the landscape of the human genome and vastly expanding the number of potential therapeutic targets. Flagship has initially committed $75M to advance the platform and generate an initial […]

Local biotechs continue to attract funding. Boston startup MOMA Therapeutics recently completed a $150 million Series B financing. “Since our launch in 2020, MOMA has advanced our novel drug discovery platform, generated multiple high-impact oncology programs and bolstered our exceptional team. Through these achievements we are developing an explicit understanding of the dynamic conformational changes of molecular […]