What You Should Know:
– Biotia, a company fighting infectious diseases powered by genomics and artificial intelligence (AI), has raised an oversubscribed $8 million Series A round led by OCA Ventures.
– OCA, a veteran early-stage venture firm operating from Chicago and Palo Alto was joined by other key investors including Continuum Health Ventures, Phoenix Venture Partners, SeedtoB Capital, SK Square Americas, Digital-Dx Ventures, and others. Prior Seed round investors include Falcon II Ventures, Tau Ventures, Hyperplane Venture Capital, Leawood Venture Capital, SpringTide Ventures, and others.
Using AI and Genomics to Combat Infectious Diseases
Biotia is a health tech company located in New York, NY, that leverages sequencing-based technology and proprietary AI-powered software to rapidly and accurately identify microorganisms and antimicrobial resistance. Their mission is to fight infectious diseases by deploying the leading reference library of microbes worldwide.
Launched from Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech, and operating from their SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University-affiliated clinical (CLIA) lab at BioBAT in New York City, Biotia has built and launched numerous advanced infectious disease research and clinical products. These include a curated leading genomics database for pathogens to better enable pathogen detection and characterization, a sequencing-based assay to detect SARS-CoV-2 genetic variants, which recently received expanded FDA EUA, and clinical-grade metagenomics assays.
“We are excited to grow our diagnostic offerings as well as our capacity for global pathogen research and surveillance,” said Dr. Niamh O’Hara, CEO of Biotia. “This is another step driving the growth of precision medicine in infectious diseases.”
At a key time in the global management of infectious diseases, with ongoing COVID-19 challenges and emerging threats, including monkeypox, Biotia through its software, data and lab assays provides clinicians, laboratories, and public health organizations with advanced tools to combat infectious diseases. “This Series A will rapidly accelerate the expansion of our company’s teams, deployment of new technologies, and rollout of new algorithms and tools that are already helping physicians, researchers, and health systems,” said Dr. Chris Mason, Co-Founder and Global Director of Biotia.
The investment will be used to rapidly expand Biotia’s technical capabilities, compliance, and marketing reach to organizations involved in the diagnosis, mitigation, and control of global infectious diseases.
