Viome Life Sciences snags $67M to broaden DTC pipeline of at-home checks and wellness merchandise

Biotechnology firm Viome Life Sciences will probably be increasing its growth of direct-to-consumer diagnostic checks and wellness merchandise after receiving $67 million in sequence C funding, the startup introduced Tuesday.

Bellevue, Washington-based Viome sells at-home testing and well being merchandise to handle power illnesses, most cancers and ageing. This contains its intestine microbiome take a look at and its human gene expression take a look at. It additionally lately launched a diagnostic take a look at for oral and throat most cancers referred to as CancerDetect, which acquired Breakthrough Gadget Designation by the Meals and Drug Administration in Might 2021. 

“Viome Life Sciences is singularly centered on empowering customers to take management of their well being by way of at-home testing and customized well being merchandise,” stated founder and CEO Naveen Jain in an e-mail.

The funding was led by Daring Capital Group, which offered the cash due to the corporate’s work in detecting power illnesses early on, stated Teymour Boutros-Ghali, managing accomplice of the agency.

“As long-standing supporters of Viome, we’ve got at all times believed deeply in Viome’s mission to establish the basis causes of power illness by honoring every individual’s biochemical individuality,” Boutros-Ghali stated within the information launch. “They’ve made great strides since our preliminary funding, and we’re proud to help Viome in its mission to offer democratized entry to customized, precision vitamin.”

Different buyers of the corporate embrace Khosla Ventures, WestRiver Group and Glico. In whole, Viome has raised greater than $150 million.

With this spherical of funding, Viome will work to create new checks and wellness merchandise for oral and skincare, Jain stated.

“Viome’s distinctive method and unparalleled perception into the human microbiome and its interplay with the human host have helped almost half 1,000,000 people higher perceive how you can take management of their well being and deal with many underlying causes of irritation and microbial imbalance, each of which science continues to hyperlink to the onset of the power illness strongly,” he declared. “With this funding, our purpose is to proceed rising this quantity and to carry Viome’s merchandise to new markets and customers.”

Viome can even broaden its line of checks for the early detection of life-threatening power illnesses and most cancers, just like the CancerDetect product, Jain stated. CancerDetect differs from different most cancers checks from corporations like Grail and Actual Sciences as a result of it takes a saliva pattern that checks for RNA as a substitute of a blood pattern that checks for DNA, stated Dr. Guru Banavar, Viome chief know-how officer, in a earlier interview. The corporate is contemplating creating checks for colorectal most cancers and different gastrointestinal cancers sooner or later, Banavar stated.

Whereas Jain didn’t identify any rivals, different at-home testing corporations embrace Cue, LetsGetChecked and Everlywell.

Picture credit score: David Hecker, Getty Pictures