This week, we are pleased to announce our investment in Nomic’s $42M oversubscribed Series B financing!
We have been keenly following the company for several years as the founders sought to bring proteomics technology to more scientists, entrepreneurs and innovators that are looking to extend human life span. We are excited to work with this team and add this company to Amplitude’s portfolio as we think Nomic has the potential to rapidly scale their nELISA platform and become a leader in the proteomics field.
Amplitude invests to create, build and grow world-leading innovative precision medicine companies and Nomic is a great example of a company that’s brought a technology to market that expands the field of proteomics. Founded in Montreal after spinning out of David Juncker’s lab, the company was started by a team of young and hungry entrepreneurs, led by Milad Dagher. Their goal was to develop a novel platform that allows scientists to better understand proteins as they look to develop new drugs and diagnostics. After several years of developing their platform, the company is now serving over 75 companies having profiled over 400,000 samples to date. We believe they’ve just begun their ascent in bringing proteomics to millions of innovators around the world.
What is proteomics?
Simply put, proteomics is the field of understanding proteins. Unlike genomics, which focuses on the static blueprint of DNA, proteomics delves into the wide dynamic world of proteins — the workhorse of the cell that executes various functions essential for life. By studying the proteome, which is all the proteins expressed by the genome, researchers can gain insights into the complex, real-time interactions that dictate cellular processes and disease states.
One of the key reasons why proteomics is the future lies in the ability to have a more nuanced understanding of cellular mechanisms. Proteins undergo various post-translational modifications and interact in complex networks which significantly alters their function. Although traditional genomics might identify genes associated with a disease, proteomics reveals how these genes are translated into malfunctioning proteins, providing a clearer picture of disease pathways and potential therapeutic targets. This depth of understanding is crucial in developing precise and personalized medicines and diagnostics for patients.
To date, the field of proteomics has largely been uncovered through technologies such as mass spectrometry and protein microarrays which have rapidly enhanced our ability to analyze complex protein mixtures. However, these analytical technologies are limited by their cost, inflexibility and time. This is where Nomic comes in.
How is Nomic solving the problem?
Nomic has developed a brand new platform called the nELISA which aims to make the human proteome as broadly and easily accessible as the human genome. This platform was developed as a next-generation ELISA platform for measuring proteins at scale and at high throughput. To measure proteins today, several companies leverage traditional multiplexing where you mix antibodies in traditional ELISAs but these can be limited by cross-reactivity and thus don’t give you the best results. Nomic has miniaturized immunoassays into small beads which isolates target-specific antibody pairs to their own colour-coded beads, thereby physically preventing cross-reactive interactions. This allows the company to get highly specific results but also allows them to leverage the high throughput capability of the ELISA platform, thereby allowing them to profile tens of thousands of samples in a fraction of the time at a fraction of the cost.
The company has now brought this technology to market and serves companies spanning the top-10 pharmas, biotechs and research institutes. This financing round will allow the company to scale its commercial operations, extend the analytical capacity of its proprietary platform and accelerate an expansion into other markets across therapeutic development and clinical applications.
Canada’s continuation of developing and scaling world-class companies
Amplitude is extremely bullish on the exciting innovation coming out of the Canadian ecosystem to build globally competitive life sciences companies that can massively impact human health and compete on a global stage.
Nomic is a great example of a world-class company with global ambitions that has been aided by local resources to get the company where it is today. With an exceptional young team, a proprietary platform that expands the proteomics market, partnerships with leading companies, experienced investors and an expansion of the proteomics space, Nomic has positioned itself as a leader in the years to come.
We are thrilled we get to help scale this company and we look forward to bringing proteomics to more scientists to make a huge impact on patient’s lives.
