Polaris leads $27m round for Singapore's Engine Biosciences
US healthcare and life sciences growth investor Polaris Partners has led a USD 27m Series A round for Singapore-based cancer medicine developer Engine Biosciences.
Several Singaporean investors also participated, including EDBI, Coronet Ventures, ClavystBio, a life sciences investment unit of Temasek Holdings, and Enterprise Singapore’s investment arm Seeds Capital. They were further supported by US family office Invus. Wen Qi Ho, therapeutics lead at ClavystBio, has joined the Engine board.
It brings total funding since the company’s inception in 2014 to USD 86m, including a USD 43m round led by Polaris in 2021. That round also featured EDBI and Invus, as well as China’s WuXi PharmaTech and several regional and global VC firms.
Engine, which also maintains a base in Silicon Valley, uses a precision medicine R&D platform to decipher biological networks and identify the genetic drivers of diseases. These insights reveal targets and inform the development of therapeutics in ovarian, colorectal, liver, lung, and prostate cancers.
Engine claims to have discovered more than 30 clinical research indicators known as biomarkers. These biomarkers are said to have been validated to sensitise tumours to specific clinical-stage investigational drugs. They are described as presenting near-term potential to enhance clinical outcomes, increase commercial potential, and improve drug development economics.
Engine’s programs and platform are underpinned by an extensive patent portfolio. The Series A capital will be used to advance the biomarker and target discoveries programme through internal development, collaborations, and partnerships. The company claims to already have an “extensive” patent portfolio in this area.
“We have witnessed first-hand Engine’s considerable progress since our initial investment, advancing its technologies towards compelling precision medicines positioned for translation,” Amy Schulman, a managing partner at Polaris, said in a statement.
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