mo:re, a German life science & animal-free drug development startup, has raised €2.3 million in seed funding to accelerate the commercialization of its lab platform for complex cell culture workflows. High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF) led the round, with participation from Innovationsstarter Fonds Hamburg (IFH), Gilson Inc., NEDGEX, Nidobirds Ventures, and Private Investors R&R Medical and Martin Blüggel.
There is much agreement in the scientific community that organoids represent a significant step in the evolution to more representative disease modeling. The path to faster approval of more relevant drugs includes modern organoid models. This has been recognized by the FDA as well with their new guidelines clearing the path to replacing animal experiments with relevant organoid models. The field is missing the means for the broad application of organoids in higher throughput that achieves reproducible results in a standardized environment.
mo:re has developed a groundbreaking lab platform, combining automation and software for planning, executing, and analysis of cell culture studies. The user-friendly platform aims to simplify cell culture, making organoids accessible as a standard lab technique and providing verifiable results. The lab automation device covers all relevant process steps, setting a new benchmark for scalability, reproducibility, and standardization of 3D cell culture models.
Lukas Gaats – CEO at mo:re: “With this funding, we want to establish our presence in the market and continue building our team. Now it is time to focus our resources on developing further scientific applications to unlock the potential our platform has to offer together with our customers as well as our internal R&D lab.”
Dr. Christian Kannemeier – Senior Investment Manager at HTGF: “The Team of mo:re is poised to execute on its vision to provide easy access to a standardized way of performing 3D cell culture and obtain reproducible results for researchers worldwide.”
Stefanie Höhn – Senior Investment Manager at IFH: “Our investment in mo:re reflects our confidence in their visionary product to tackle cell culture challenges. Their platform can redefine the landscape of non-animal methods in the Life Science Industry.”
Dirk Freystadt – SVP of Corporate Development at Gilson Inc.: “Verifiable data in drug discovery and development are crucial for accelerating the creation of new and effective pharmaceuticals. mo:re’s innovative technological approach provides an important step toward standardizing organoid growth, significantly enhancing their quality. This will not only improve the speed and reliability of drug discovery but also deliver more consistent results for research, ultimately reducing the reliance on animal testing.”
About HTGF – High-Tech Gründerfonds:
HTGF is one of the leading and most active early-stage investors in Germany and Europe, financing start-ups in the fields of DeepTech, IndustrialTech, ClimateTech, DigitalTech, Life Sciences, and Chemistry. Moreover, with its experienced investment team, HTGF supports start-ups in all phases of their development into international market leaders. HTGF invests in pre-seed and seed phases and can participate significantly in later-stage financing rounds. Moreover, across its funds, HTGF has over 2 billion euros under management. Since its inception in 2005, HTGF has financed more than 770 start-ups and achieved almost 200 successful exits.
Fund investors in the public-private partnership include the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, KfW Capital as well as 45 companies and family offices.
