MUNICH — Biotech firm mbiomics secured 30 million euros in a Series A financing round to advance its gut microbiome cancer therapy toward clinical evaluation, the company said in a statement on Tuesday. The Munich-based enterprise plans to utilize the fresh financing to push its experimental treatment into human trials after years of academic research and laboratory development by scientists.
Venture investors MIG Fonds and Bayern Kapital led the financing round in Munich, according to disclosures released by mbiomics. The capital will directly fund Phase 1B clinical trials for a lead co-therapy designed to alter immune responses in patients diagnosed with solid tumors by targeting specific bacterial strains living in the human digestive tract over the next 24 months.
Laboratories located in southern Germany will spend a significant portion of the 30 million euros to hire additional research microbiologists, purchase stainless steel bioreactors, and expand manufacturing runs for the live bacterial mixtures packed into experimental oral capsules. Developing these living medicines requires strict temperature controls, sterile cleanrooms, and specialized fermentation equipment, which drives up daily operational expenses long before a drug candidate ever reaches a hospital pharmacy shelf or a regulated clinical trial site, the company said.
Venture capitalists have poured hundreds of millions of euros into microbiome startups over the past decade, drawn by promising laboratory data even as many previous clinical candidates stalled out in human testing phases. Companies working with live bacteria frequently face complex hurdles in manufacturing consistency, strain stability, and strict regulatory oversight, prompting financial backers to scrutinize cash burn rates and laboratory milestones much more closely than they did during the peak funding years of the previous tech boom, according to mbiomics.
Mbiomics executives plan to submit regulatory filings and deploy the capital injection over the next 24 months, though company representatives have not yet disclosed the exact hospital clinic locations or the specific dates when patient recruitment will officially begin for the upcoming trials.
