Cancer Diagnostics Biotech Lands $13 Million Series B Funds

(National Institutes of Health)

Epic Sciences Inc., a biotechnology diagnostics developer in San Diego, secured $13 million in series B financing, the second round of venture funding after initial start-up. The funding round includes new investors Domain Associates, Roche Venture Fund, and Pfizer Venture Investments, as well as undisclosed individual participants.

Epic Sciences exclusively licensed research by the lab of Peter Kuhn at Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. Kuhn’s research involves detection of circulating tumor cells in the blood to better detect cancer and to monitor and personalize cancer treatments.

Metastasis — the spread of cancer from its primary site to other places in the body — is the leading cause of mortality in patients with cancer. This spread of cancer cells is the result of tumor cells, called circulating tumor cells, that escape from the primary tumor into the bloodstream and travel to distant sites where they develop into secondary tumors.

Most current cancer diagnostics require biopsies, taking samples from solid tumors. Biopsies, however, cannot be done repeatedly and tell little about metastatic risk, disease progression, or treatment effectiveness.

Circulating tumor cells occur in low concentrations in the blood, making their isolation and identification a difficult task. Epic Sciences is developing a blood test to detect and profile biomarkers on circulating tumor cells that can be done repeatedly and can give real-time information about a patient’s disease status to tailor treatments to that patient’s tumor.

Epic Sciences plans to use the proceeds of the funding to expand research and development operations for commercializing the technology platform licensed from Scripps. In August, the company unveiled collaborations with six pharmaceutical companies, which are expected to result in a series of 12 clinical trials applying Epic Sciences’ technology to detection of prostate, lung, breast, pancreatic and ovarian cancers.

Read more:

• Diagnostics Company Lands $12 Million Series B Funds
• Foundation Medicine, Clovis Oncology Partner on Diagnostics
• Cancer Diagnostics Company Gains $5M in Early Round Funds
• Collaboration Targets New Circulating Tumor Cell Technology

Hat tip: Fortune/Term Sheet

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