Apollo Health Ventures and Paul Scherrer Institute Launch Focal Biosciences

- Newly established Focal Biosciences will focus on bringing together leading experts and scientific discoveries to harness cellular reprogramming in the fight against common age-related diseases

BOSTON & BERLIN & VILLIGEN, Switzerland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apollo Health Ventures and the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) launched Focal Biosciences. The newly established biotech company aims to redefine the treatment of age-related diseases by reprogramming deregulated cell states that drive the detrimental processes underlying many serious diseases of aging that represent a significant health burden.

Apollo Health Ventures and the Paul Scherrer Institute will join their resources together with scientific founder Prof. G.V. Shivashankar, Head of the Laboratory of Nanoscale Biology, Paul Scherrer Institute and Professor of Mechano-Genomics, ETH Zurich, a recognized leader in mechanogenomics with strong expertise in cellular reprogramming. The newly founded entity will initially operate out of the Paul Scherrer Institute, the largest research institute for natural and engineering sciences in Switzerland that serves scientists around the world by accommodating highly complicated experiments in their industry-leading research facilities. Focal Biosciences thereby has access to PSI’s key infrastructure and expertise as part of Apollo's venture creation program, “Venture Labs” that sources leading science from scientists and labs in Europe and North America, based on its deep understanding of the biology of aging.

“Our investment approach is focused on identifying outstanding science to catalyze and build transformational companies and taking an active role in their corporate evolution. We have watched the formation and maturation of the cellular reprogramming space for some time,” said Jan Adams, Venture Partner at Apollo Health Ventures. “We are confident that with the expertise and technologies developed by Prof. Shivashankar at PSI, Focal Biosciences is pursuing a unique and innovative approach leveraging an advanced concept of cellular reprogramming, that will enable the development of a novel class of therapies.”

“We value Apollo Health Ventures’ and PSI’s commitment to our scientific vision of how to fundamentally change the treatment landscape for a variety of age-related diseases,” said Prof. G.V. Shivashankar, Scientific Founder of Focal Biosciences, Head of the Laboratory of Nanoscale Biology, Paul Scherrer Institute and Professor of Mechano-Genomics, ETH Zurich. “I look forward to working with the expert team at Apollo to position Focal Biosciences for success and build a company that trailblazes a new path for patients with severe diseases.”

Advances in understanding the biology of aging coupled with emerging technologies have significantly increased pre-symptomatic detection of age-related damage and dysfunction and paved the way for novel interventions. Cellular reprogramming in particular provides a novel approach of resetting damaged or dysfunctional cells to a healthy state, reversing disease mechanisms and stopping detrimental processes to transform the treatment landscape of age-related diseases.

About Focal Biosciences

Focal Biosciences is redefining the treatment of age-related diseases by applying its deep scientific expertise in the mechanisms of cellular reprograming to reverse detrimental disease processes and restore health.

About Apollo Health Ventures

Apollo Health Ventures is a transatlantic venture capital firm specialized in developing and investing in data-driven biotechnology and health tech ventures. Apollo Health Ventures invests in game-changing companies at the seed or early stage and builds companies within the aging sector. Apollo’s team consists of entrepreneurs, seasoned biotech investors and scientists with remarkable track records in life science investments and venture creation.

About Paul Scherrer Institute

The Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) develops, builds and operates large, complex research facilities and makes them available to the national and international research community. The institute's own key research priorities are in the fields of matter and materials, energy and environment and human health. PSI is committed to the training of future generations. Therefore, about one quarter of our staff are post-docs, post-graduates or apprentices. Altogether PSI employs 2200 people, thus being the largest research institute in Switzerland. The annual budget amounts to approximately CHF 400 million. PSI is part of the ETH Domain, with the other members being the two Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology, ETH Zurich and EPFL Lausanne, as well as Eawag (Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology), Empa (Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology) and WSL (Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research).

Apollo Health Ventures
Dr. Jan Adams
Venture Partner
jan@apollo.vc

Trophic Communications
Stephanie May & Eva Mulder
+49 89 238 877 30
apollo@trophic.eu