A newly launched St. Louis startup focused on providing research and development services for biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies has raised funding to expand its technology and headcount.
The startup, Panome Bio, said Wednesday it has closed a growth financing round led by San Francisco-based venture capital firm Telegraph Hill Partners. BioGenerator Ventures, the startup investment arm of St. Louis-based innovation hub BioSTL, also invested in the round. BioGenerator has assisted in creating Panome and provided capital to begin its operations, the startup said.
Panome did not disclose the amount of its funding round, but a regulatory document it filed Feb. 24 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission showed the company has raised $6 million in equity financing.
Founded in 2022, Panome describes itself as a “discovery services” contract research organization that has technology designed to provide better data to aid disease and drug discovery research efforts. It focuses on metabolomics, which involves examining small molecules in a cell, and proteomics, the analysis of proteins, to help its customers discover biomarkers. Panome has commercialized technology created by its chief scientific officer, Gary Patti, a chemistry professor at Washington University.
Panome CEO Ed Weinstein said the startup’s formation comes as biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies increasingly turn to third parties to assist them in research and development initiatives that require specialized technical and scientific capabilities.
“They just don’t want to have to build things like this themselves,” Weinstein said. “You look at the trends over the past 10 years and more and more biotech and pharma (firms) want to do these very complex technical experimentations and outsource them. They are looking for companies that have cutting-edge technology, but also that they trust in the ability to deliver.”
Panome launched its services in December at American Society for Cell Biology’s annual conference, Weinstein said, with the startup currently working with customers in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries.
Panome marks the latest St. Louis-based research-focused company involving Weinstein and fellow co-founder David Smoller. They both were part of the founding team of Canopy Biosciences, a provider of gene editing, gene expression and bioprocessing products and services. Canopy, of which Weinstein was formerly CEO, sold in September 2020 to Massachusetts-based scientific instrument marker Bruker Corp. (NASDAQ: BRKR). Before Canopy, Weinstein and Smoller were both co-founders at Sage Labs, which was spun out of Sigma-Aldrich in 2013 and sold the next year.
Weinstein said Panome plans to use its growth financing to target new technologies for development and to add to its laboratory facilities. The startup is based in the BioSTL Building, at 4340 Duncan Ave. in the Cortex innovation district. Panome also expects to add to its headcount, particularly in sales and marketing, Weinstein said. The company currently has about 10 employees and expects to double that in the near future. Weinstein said Panome has a preference for hiring talent in St. Louis, but added it plans to add business development roles that will be based in geographic territories outside the region.
“Between MilliporeSigma, Bayer, Washington University and Pfizer, there’s great scientific talent here,” Weinstein said.
While Weinstein has guided other startups locally to exits in the past, he said Panome brings with it a unique feeling of excitement because of technology, its team’s expertise and emerging trends in its industry.
“It’s just all the parts coming together exactly right. This is really the most excited I’ve been about something,” he said.
