Forcyte Biotechnologies Secures Funding; Totals $5.7M
Summary
Forcyte Biotechnologies, a Los Angeles, CA-based tech-enabled drug discovery company targeting diseases of mechanobiology, secured new funding of undisclosed amount. Backers included Milestone View, Pioneer Fund, Acequia Capital, Y Combinator, Jude Gomila (CEO, Golden), and others. Including public support, this funding brings Forcyte’s total raised to $5.7M for their internal “mechano-therapeutic” pipeline, focusing first on fibrosis. Led by co-founder and CEO Ivan Pushkarsky, PhD., Forcyte has developed a platform that uses both proprietary wet-lab micro-technologies and computer-vision algorithms to quantify the physical forces generated by millions of individual human cells in carefully controlled microenvironments engineered within 384-well plates where single-cells bind to and “squeeze” vast arrays of adhesive micropatterns. The company, internally and via partnerships, is launching a pipeline of programs targeting mechanically-active disease processes including fibrotic diseases, dystrophies, and hyper- and hypo-responsiveness in organs including the bladder, airway, blood vessels, and uterus.