Basecamp Research on September 23 announced it had closed a $140 million Series C to accelerate its portfolio of AI-designed cell and gene therapies. The London-based company said the round was led by S32, the fund set up by Google Ventures founding partner Bill Maris, with participation from NVIDIA, the Anthology Fund (a joint venture between Anthropic and Menlo Ventures), the Rockefeller family office and Roche vice-chairman André Hoffmann, alongside more than a dozen additional investors.
Scaling EDEN And The Trillion Gene Atlas
The proceeds will scale EDEN, Basecamp Research's family of biological foundation models. The current 28-billion-parameter release is trained on the company's proprietary Trillion Gene Atlas - a dataset built with more than 100 national parks and conservation groups worldwide. EDEN is used to design novel proteins, gene edits and cell therapies, and Basecamp claims it now covers six in-house therapeutic programs targeting in vivo cell reprogramming and genetic medicine.
Pharma Partnerships In Focus
Chief executive Glen Gowers said the funding will bankroll new pharmaceutical partnerships to bring AI-designed medicines through clinical trials. "We believe the future of medicine lies in reprogramming the body to repair itself. We design the models and the medicines to teach it how," Gowers said in the funding announcement.
Second Round In Six Months For A Biology Foundation-Model Lab
The Series C lands the same week Snorkel AI raised $350 million and follows recent mega-rounds for AI-native biotechs including Anthropic's autonomous CRISPR-like enzyme discovery, signaling ongoing investor appetite for foundation models trained on biological data rather than text.
Reporting based on coverage from SiliconANGLE, PR Newswire, European Biotechnology Magazine and Endpoints News.