Editor's note: In our 2024 Startups to Watch feature, the Silicon Valley Business Journal and San Francisco Business Times present startups and founders building groundbreaking products and companies in the Bay Area. Minutia is one of 17 we profiled this year — to read more about our mission and the other startups we're featuring, click here.
Minutia CEO Katy Digovich says she is working on the one thing she wants to see most in the world. It's what drives her. Living with Type 1 diabetes, she once eschewed the thought of working on the disease full time: It already took up enough of her mental energy just dealing with the illness and managing her insulin levels.
But after working on global health for the Clinton Global Initiative in countries like Botswana, Myanmar and Ethiopia, she came to realize that this form of diabetes is akin to a death sentence in much of the developing world and demanded a "permanent" solution.
About Minutia
- Founded: 2020
- Founders: CEO Katy Digovich, Matthias Hebrok, Tuan Vo-Dinh
- HQ: Berkeley
- Employees: 11
- Total funding: Undisclosed
"It was very disturbing, some of these conversations," she said. "So I decided I wanted to pivot my whole career into the Type 1 diabetes space.”
Minutia is on a mission to develop a “functional cure” for Type 1 diabetes by creating insulin-producing cells in the lab. These cells could be transplanted into patients to reverse their diabetes without the need for lifelong anti-rejection drugs.
Digovich partnered with leading UCSF stem cell researcher Dr. Matthias Hebrok to explore solutions. A key insight was the need for “real time data on what was happening with transplanted cells” to understand the variability in patient outcomes. This spurred the idea to put “sensors in patients' cells inside to get real time information.
Minutia’s breakthrough is combining lab-grown insulin producing cells with embedded sensors to track their function when transplanted. The sensors provide visibility on what’s happening with cells to "ensure that transplanted cells are safe, and also try to maximize success,” Digovich said.
She stresses the critical safety aspect, as hiding cells from the immune system to avoid rejection could allow undetected problems.
The company aims to begin first-in-human trials of its sensored cell therapy within five years. Its goal is “a functional cure that lasts as long as possible" providing “diabetes-free” life without lifelong immunosuppressive drugs. Digovich says the company is setting a high bar for safety and efficacy before she would personally undergo such a transplant.
Investors have rallied around the company’s patient-led approach.
“So many people involved in minutia have that motivation, I think it gives us a sense of grit and strong resilience,” Digovich said.
About half those working at Minutia live with Type 1 themselves, as well as many of its angel investors.
Even amid a funding crunch squeezing biotech startups, Digovich said the company is determined to follow through in providing its treatment to the millions suffering from Type 1 diabetes. "
"If we have a cash crunch, like I’m, you know, I’m gonna put all my savings into the company," she said. “If I have to stop paying myself I will.”
In the long run, Digovich hopes to provide access globally to the "No. 1 thing I want to exist" — affordable cell therapy that could save millions of lives.
"To be able to get a product to market that can reverse my own diabetes, but is also such a good product that it can be delivered to low- and middle-income countries, this is one of the main challenges we face,” she said.
If their treatment can successfully pass the rigorous regulatory hurdles of clinical trials it can one day replace insulin injections with a one-time minimally invasive procedure that could revolutionize treatment in poorer nations lacking access to daily treatments.
It’s a lofty goal, but the Minutia team is driven by their personal experiences in the difficulties of living with the disease and the necessity of finding a cure.
As Digovich puts it, “It is humbling. And it is an honor and a privilege to do work that has the potential to impact people’s lives.”
