Flash Therapeutics Scales up, Becoming a Leader in the Bioproduction of DNA and RNA Lentiviral Technologies

•  €15M, 3-year financing agreement with TECHLIFE CAPITAL and ELAIA PARTNERS
• First installment payment of €4M in July 2021
• Objective to double its production capacity by 2022
• Expand clinical batch production until 2025
• Produce clinical batches on a large scale
• Provide long-term support to its customers and their projects

TOULOUSE, France--(BUSINESS WIRE)--In order to meet the rapidly growing global demand for gene, cell and RNA therapies, Flash Therapeutics, a CDMO with strong technological expertise, is accelerating the ramp-up of its biomanufacturing capabilities. This will allow it to position itself for the production of large-scale clinical batches, including both integrative DNA and RNA technologies (proprietary LentiFlash® technology).

This ambition requires an overall investment of around €15M to ensure the growth of its production capacity to industrial level (GMP). In this context, Flash Therapeutics has signed a 3-year investment agreement of at least €15M with TechLife Capital and Elaia Partners. The first tranche payment of €4M made in July 2021 allows Flash Therapeutics to double its infrastructure over the next 12 months and to strengthen its commercial, process, analytical and production teams.

Flash Therapeutics' strength and differentiator lies in its expertise in lentiviral transfer technologies (DNA and RNA) and its biomanufacturing process. The company offers a continuum of high purity vector manufacturing from research to clinical phases, accelerating therapeutic programs for its global customers (laboratories and biotechnology companies). Based in France, Flash Therapeutics is a key international, industrial partner for gene and cell therapy programs (genetic diseases, infectious diseases, cancers) and vaccination.

Pascale Bouillé, President of Flash Therapeutics, commented: "This first tranche of €4 million in financing will allow us to continue the scale-up of biomanufacturing activities within Flash Therapeutics and to position ourselves for the launch of clinical batch manufacturing in 2025. We will continue to develop our gene transfer technologies offering our customers innovative and differentiating tools, as well as to offer fast-growing production capacities. Our goal is to double in size by the second half of 2022 and to produce the first LentiFlash® messenger RNA clinical batch by the end of 2022.”

Jacques Rossignol, Managing Partner of TechLife Capital, added: "We are delighted to support Flash Therapeutics in its expansion. We were particularly attracted by the depth and dynamics of the underlying markets, by the vision and experience of Pascale Bouillé, by the excellence and know-how of the team, by the quality of the biotech clients, and by the solid reputation of this French company in Europe, as well as in the United States, Israel and Asia. Flash Therapeutics is positioned at the heart of the needs of gene, cell and mRNA therapies, and corresponds perfectly to TechLife Capital's desire to accompany partner companies in the service of biotechnology, which is one of the sectoral themes in which we strongly believe.”

Franck Lescure, Partner at Elaia Partners, highlighted: "Thanks to this financing, Flash Therapeutics continues to expand and reaches a milestone. We are moving from a technology validated by international experts and marketed worldwide, to an industrial platform that enables the development of innovative therapeutic and prophylactic agents. Flash Therapeutics' offer meets the needs and current requirements in terms of quality and efficiency of the healthcare industry. The company now has all the attributes to become an international leader in an extremely dynamic field. It is also a validation of the relevance of our Bioseeds fund, a seed fund specialized in Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, with which we support Flash Therapeutics since 2016.”

About Flash Therapeutics

Founded in 2005 and based in Toulouse, France, Flash Therapeutics is a gene therapy company that develops and produces DNA and RNA transfer technologies for the development of innovative therapies. Thanks to its scalable biomanufacturing processes, the company offers a manufacturing continuum (from research to the clinic), accelerating the clinical proof of concept of new drugs. In particular, the company's proprietary LentiFlash® delivery technology, mediated by a lentiviral particle carrying only RNA, is dedicated to vaccination, gene editing and other disruptive therapeutic approaches.

FLASH THERAPEUTICS: Jean-Christophe Huertas – jean-christophe.huertas@flashtherapeutics.com
TECHLIFE CAPITAL : Jacques Rossignol – jacques.rossignol@techlifecapital.com
ELAIA PARTNERS : Louisa Mesnard – CMO Elaia – lmesnard@elaia.com