AI2 Incubator spinout Modulus sells cell therapy tech assets to Boston’s Ginkgo Bioworks
Human Natural Killer cell. (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Image) The news: Modulus Therapeutics, a Seattle-based cellular therapy Seattle-based cellular therapy company Modulus Therapeutics, a spinout of the Allen Institute of Artificial Intelligence (AI2) Incubator, has sold its cell therapy platform assets to Boston biotech company Ginkgo Bioworks. The companies did not disclose the financial terms of the acquisition. Modulus, which launched in 2020, has focused on generating performance-enhancing genetic changes in natural killer (NK) cells, an immune cell type for use against auto-immune diseases. The company hopes to use these libraries to develop more effective and safer medical therapies. The acquisition of assets alone does not include Modulus employees. It is unclear if Modulus is still operating.
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The news: Modulus Therapeutics, a Seattle-based cellular therapy company spun out of the Allen Institute of Artificial Intelligence (AI2) Incubator, has sold its cell therapy platform assets to the Boston biotech company Ginkgo Bioworks.
The companies did not disclose the terms of the acquisition. An article by Fierce Biotech noted that Ginkgo’s business development team has snapped up a string of companies and assets in recent months.
The tech: Modulus has focused on generating performance-enhancing genetic changes in natural killer (NK) cells, an up-and-coming immune cell type for use against auto-immune diseases.
The startup, which launched in 2020, created a platform to build libraries of unique cell therapy receptors from NK and T-cells. Ginkgo hopes it will be able to use these libraries to develop more effective and safer medical therapies.
“We’re really proud of the novel functionality we’ve been able to build into cell therapy candidates using custom immune receptors. With hundreds of new receptor designs now in the Ginkgo arsenal, we can’t wait to see how Ginkgo’s scale can help accelerate the adoption of these technologies!” said Modulus co-founder and CEO Max Darnell in a LinkedIn post on Tuesday.
GeekWire reached out to Modulus for additional comment and we’ll update when we hear back.
Background: Darnell co-founded the company with bioinformatician and Chief Data Scientist Bryce Daines. The pair met as entrepreneurs-in-residence at AI2.
In 2021, Madrona Venture Group led two seed investment rounds for Modulus that totaled $3.78 million and included participation from KdT Ventures, AI2 and AI2 Incubator, according to PitchBook.
The deal with Ginkgo is an acquisition of assets alone and does not include Modulus employees, according to Ginkgo. It is unclear if Modulus is still operating. LinkedIn profiles of two of the nine-person Modulus team show they departed the company in February.
Related news: Modulus, a cell therapy biotech incubated at the Allen Institute for AI, raises $3.5M