Deal focus: VCs back ACT’s customized cancer care model

The contribution of genetics to cancer treatment is all about scope and scale. The more genes are tested, the greater number of therapeutic options can be drawn from the data and used to create treatment programs. However, many hospitals will only provide personal genomic testing for a few cancer-related genes, so their options are limited.

"Normally a hospital will test one or two genes from a cancer patient. Doctors do this because they just want to confirm that they can give certain drugs to a patient. That's not our objective. We want to provide as many treatment options as we can through broader genomic testing," says Angus Wu, an associate director at Taiwan-based ACT Genomics.

Founded in 2014, ACT uses a sequencing and multiplex molecular testing platform to screen for more than 400 cancer-related genes in tumor samples collected from patients. These tests generate genomic profiling and molecular information that is used to draw up a list of treatments, which are either already approved by the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) or clinical drugs from academic research.

The idea is that doctors can devise fully personalized programs, based not only on how developed the cancer - prevention, early detection or disease monitoring - but also how individual patients are likely to respond to different drugs.

"We provide more possibilities for cancer treatments" Wu says. "For example, therapies used to treat breast cancer might be suitable to treat lung cancer too. We provide comprehensive analytical reports to doctors, not just DNA sequencing data. That's why doctors see our reports as valuable and are willing to pay a premium for the service."

ACT's model has not yet reached commercialization, but VC investors are impressed. Last week, existing backer Hotung Group and new investor CDIB Capital co-led a $12.5 million Series B round of funding for the company. Other participants included Eminent II VC, Hua Nan Venture Capital, President International Development and UMC Capital. The company previously received $8 million last year.

With its service currently being trialed by three hospitals in Taiwan, ACT has spent the last year upgrading its laboratory to international standard. Last month it was accredited by the College of American Pathologists (CAP), which certifies laboratories that meet regulatory requirements. Only five oncology-testing laboratories in Asia have achieved this status.

The next step is expansion into the rapidly growing Asia testing market, with a particular focus on Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Hong Kong. Wu notes that the VC environment has become more active in Taiwan, especially for biotechnology investments, and so ACT expects to receive more funding.

"We are the only company providing such information to cancer treatment specialists in Asia. We expect that most of our revenue will be generated from hospitals in the future," he says.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Healthcare
• Venture
• Early-stage
• Taiwan (China)
• CDIB Capital
• Hotung International