BioTools Innovator Announces Top 19 Life Sciences Companies Named to the 2023 Cohort

Startups will participate in a customized mentorship program and compete for $300,000 in cash prizes

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--BioTools Innovator, the first accelerator focused on life science tools and diagnostics to advance cutting-edge research and improve human health, announced today that 19 companies have been selected to participate in its annual program. The BioTools Innovator Accelerator is a four-month virtual program providing startups with in-depth, customized mentorship and support from senior industry leaders, funding opportunities, and engagement with peers and advisors.

This year’s cohort was chosen after review and evaluation by the BioTools Innovator team, the senior leadership teams of its corporate partners at Research Corporation Technologies, BroadOak Capital Partners, Nissan Chemical America Corporation, and over 80 industry judges from leading life science firms. From a pool of more than 260 applicants from 31 countries and 34 U.S. states, the top 19 companies were selected to participate in the BioTools Innovator Accelerator.

Reviewers and experts that participated in BioTools Innovator Accelerator pitch events included representatives from Agilent, AstraZeneca, Becton, Dickinson and Company, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), Catalent Pharma Solutions, Danaher, Draper, Eppendorf, Foresite Labs, Genentech, General Inception, Genoa Ventures, Illumina Ventures, Johnson & Johnson Innovation, Maravai LifeSciences, Northpond Ventures, PacBio, Qiagen, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Teknova, VC23, Zeiss Ventures among others.

“BioTools Innovator was launched to provide life science entrepreneurs guidance from experienced industry leaders in biotools and diagnostics to help them be successful,” said Kathryn Zavala, managing director of BioTools Innovator. “Now in our third year, we’ve built a reputation for identifying and nurturing the most promising life science tools and diagnostics companies, with the goal of improving how therapeutics are developed and making diagnostics faster and more accurate.”

The 19 companies participating in the BioTools Accelerator are:

Andson Biotech (Atlanta, GA) - Combining high-throughput microfluidics and advanced analytics to unlock mass spectrometry for biologics, cell and gene therapies, and beyond

Aopia Biosciences (Pleasanton, Calif.) - NanoEX is a next-gen exosome isolation platform that fundamentally addresses all existing issues

Argome (San Diego, Calif.) - Smart nanoparticle platform for a unified next-gen multiomic workflow

Atomnaut (San Francisco, Calif.) - AtomScope is the world's highest resolution microscope - in-situ vitrification, 3D atomic-scale imaging and mass spectrometry

Aureka Biotechnologies (Laguna Hills, Calif.) – Developing a best-in-class therapeutic discovery platform that integrates high-throughput, single-cell-based functional screening with AI-based drug design and development

BacStitch DNA (Los Altos, Calif.) – Simplified and scaled engineering of long and complex DNA

BennuBio (Albuquerque, New Mexico) – A simplified approach for rapid, high throughput multiplex analysis of intact 3D multicellular models to advance biological discovery and accelerate drug development

BioRaptor (Binyamina, Israel) – The operating system for biotechnology companies, an end-to-end AI-powered data platform accelerating time to market, lowering costs, and improving quality

CRISPR QC (San Diego, Calif.) – Empowering scientists with the knowledge to control and predict gene editing

Indee Labs (Berkeley, Calif.) – We develop, market and sell instruments for more effective engineered cell therapies

Kilobaser (San Francisco, Calif. and Graz, Austria) – On a mission to decentralize the pharmaceutical industry by providing fully automated desktop nucleic acid synthesis devices

Limula (Vaud, Switzerland) - A fully-automated solution for scale down / scale out of cell therapy manufacturing

mk2 Biotechnologies (Bavaria, Germany) – Developing low-cost and large-scale production processes for bioactive peptides & proteins

PAK BioSolutions (Vienna, VA) – Providing automated systems for continuous purification of biopharmaceuticals that provide 4X productivity improvements

ReelReactor (Encinitas, Calif.) – Remove variability from your biomanufacturing process with ReelReactor, a compact continuous flow device that improves product quality and minimizes costs

Scribe Biosciences (San Francisco, Calif. ) – Cell therapy potency assay platform with unprecedented precision, scale, and flexibility

Switchback Systems (Santa Cruz, Calif.) – Benchtop DNA printer with unparalleled reproducibility and scalability

TeraCyte Analytics (Caesarea, Israel) – Platform to characterize temporal cell functions with game changing scale, scope and data integrity, enabling next-generation predictive AI

Twister Biosciences (Los Angeles) - Sample preparation kit for rapid, efficient growth of patient-derived cancer organoids (PDCOs) and life science applications

Five of the companies will compete in the final competition at the BioTools Innovator Capstone Event in the fall of 2023, immediately following the conclusion of the Cell & Gene Meeting on the Mesa in Carlsbad, Calif. The event will bring together senior executives, investors, and top industry decision-makers who will determine the winner of the $250,000 non-dilutive grand prize and the title of 2023 BioTools Innovator.

Funding for BioTools Innovator is provided by the Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation of RCT. Additional support is provided by BroadOak Capital Partners and Nissan Chemical America Corporation.

About BioTools Innovator

Based in Los Angeles, BioTools Innovator was established to advance cutting-edge research and improve human health by accelerating the growth of a broad spectrum of life science tools and diagnostics. BioTools Innovator matches industry leaders with innovative early stage and emerging growth biotechnology-focused companies for mentorship and support.

BioTools Innovator is powered by MedTech Innovator, is the world’s largest accelerator of medical technology companies and the premier nonprofit startup accelerator in the medical technology industry. To date, MedTech Innovator has supported 509 alumni that have gone on to raise $6.8 billion in follow-on funding, brought 140 products to market, and achieved 36 exits.

For more information about BioTools Innovator, visit the website, and follow them on LinkedIn and Twitter.