Segulah Medical Acceleration Announces Investment in SAGA Diagnostics
Segulah Medical Acceleration AB (SMA) announced today that it has invested in cancer liquid biopsy and genomic testing company SAGA Diagnostics’ oversubscribed SEK 106 million (€10.5 million) Series A2 equity financing round.
The round was led by SMA together with the Sciety investment syndicate with strong support from existing shareholders such as Hadean Ventures.
SAGA is commercializing proprietary technologies to quantify cancer-associated genetic aberrations in tissue and liquid biopsy samples and are uniquely capable of achieving limits of detection down to 0.001% mutant allele fraction.
SAGA’s platform technologies, which are based on digital PCR and next-generation sequencing, are tools to be used in cancer patient stratification, therapy response monitoring, disease relapse identification, as well as in aiding in treatment decisions and as companion diagnostics.
“In the fast-growing sector for liquid biopsy technologies with many new tests, SAGA Diagnostics stands out with their tests’ unprecedented sensitivity. We are proud to team up with SAGA and look forward to helping the team advance their strategic objectives further.” said Roger Gunnarsson, Managing Partner at SMA.
“We are delighted to complete this oversubscribed financing round with support from existing investors and also to welcome Segulah Medical Acceleration who bring significant expertise and network that will help SAGA accelerate into this next phase of the company. Building on our ultrasensitive products for liquid and tissue biopsy testing, the funds will enable us to execute on our ambitious growth plans.
We will offer a wide range of regulatory-approved assays and services using all our three technology platforms and to broaden our reach to further markets – and thus move us forward on our mission to help cancer patients to have the best possible outcomes.” said Lao Saal, CEO of SAGA Diagnostics.
SAGA already has commercial agreements with a number of pharmaceutical partners, key opinion leaders, and clinical laboratories for the use of these technologies, both as laboratory testing service and sold as reagent kits.
Funds will now be used to extend SAGA’s range of CE-marked SAGAsafe® dPCR assays, accelerate the commercialization of SAGAsign® in minimal residual disease monitoring, launch the SAGAseq® platform, establish CLIA laboratory capabilities, execute clinical studies, and perform other expansion activities.