7 genome sequencing companies to look out for

Precision medicine is a kind of treatment strategy that is tailored to individual patients, most of which is dependent on their genetic makeup. Genomics, which deals with the mapping of genomes, is a booming industry that aims to advance precision medicine to address a host of diseases. You may have heard of the big names in the business, like Illumina, Oxford Nanopore Technologies, and Thermo Fisher Scientific. But there are a number of genomics startups that have sprouted up in the past decade or so to strengthen their sequencing technologies to aid in disease prevention and treatment. 

Here are seven genome sequencing startups that are making their mark in the industry.

Element Biosciences

Founded in 2017, Element Biosciences shot to fame fairly quickly after the launch of its lab services. Its benchtop sequencing instrument AVITI has a dual flow cell layout and individually addressable lanes and you can perform two parallel runs and operate each side independently. Its alternative model, AVITI LT, is a lower-cost, lower-throughput solution that brings next-generation sequencing (NGS) to more labs.

The core components of the company’s genome sequencing tool include an Avidite base chemistry, which circularizes, copies, and rolls each strand into tightly bound polonies – tiny clusters of identical DNA molecules – without the use of PCR and fluorescent avidites that bind to each polony creating ultrastable complexes. It also employs rolling circle amplification, which is a process that uses a circular DNA template to create long single-stranded DNA molecules to avoid errors such as index hopping – when sequencing reads are incorrectly assigned to the wrong sample in a pool. 

Its sought-after technology is called LoopSeq, which prepares libraries for long-read sequencing on the short-read Element AVITI System. The 16S LoopSeq for AVITI kits targets the identity and relative species abundance – the measure of how common a species is in a particular area – of a microbial community, for results that span entire molecules. It also uses its platform ElemBio Cloud to monitor runs, visualize metrics, and manage data and instruments.

The California-based biotech also hosts the AVITI Accelerator Grant program, which gives scientists the opportunity to push their research further using Element’s NGS products. Last year, Element raised $277 million in a series D funding round for the commercialization of AVITI, and to bolster the upcoming launch of AVITI24 – the first instrument to combine sequencing and cyto-profiling (mapping of cells) into a single platform. Now, the California-based biotech has positioned itself as a challenger to established NGS giants such as Illumina and Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Deep Genomics

RNA therapeutics have come a long way since they were first developed in the 1990s, and currently, these classes of medicines are key to treating and preventing a number of infectious and rare diseases. Deep Genomics thinks that this is only the beginning.

As RNA-based treatments can be created to target genetic causes, they could address genetic conditions. However, to develop these therapies, information regarding RNA biology needs to be mined. The Canadian startup has developed an artificial intelligence (AI) platform to identify drug candidates that are rooted in RNA biology. Its platform BigRNA is the world’s first RNA foundation model for RNA therapeutics and can scout for druggable targets and RNA therapeutic candidates that would not be otherwise found using traditional approaches. 

BigRNA is trained to predict RNA expression at the sub-gene level. It is designed to predict molecule-target across a wide range of species, tissues, cell models, and RNA technologies, such as oligonucleotides, DNA editing, RNA editing, and mRNA.

It was awarded the Stevie Award for Technology Excellence last year, three years after it bagged $180 million in series C financing to advance its AI discovery platform and grow its preclinical pipeline.

Human Longevity

What if there was a way to detect early signs of certain diseases and prevent them altogether? That’s precisely what California-based Human Longevity aims to accomplish. By extracting health data, it seeks to establish the health and risk profiles of individuals to enhance brain function, sleep, nutrition, and mobility – which the company refers to as the pillars of longevity.

As a part of this, the company offers whole genome sequencing – a process that determines the sequence of an organism’s DNA to detect mutations and disease risks – which is part of an advanced diagnostic package that costs $8000. 

It has previously joined forces with UCLA, Stanford Medicines, Johns Hopkins Medicine, Mayo Clinic, and Cleveland Clinic, to name a few. Most recently, it partnered with California-based sleep research center SleepScore Labs to launch an AI-driven personalized precision sleep program. This will combine Human Longevity’s genomic analysis capabilities with SleepScore’s sleep datasets to create algorithms and personalized solutions. 

Last year, it formed an alliance with the Chopra Foundation in a bid to promote longevity and holistic well-being. It also pocketed $39.8 million in a series B round to fund its precision medicine program.

NantOmics

Focused on addressing cancer through precision medicine, American startup NantOmics is on a mission to scan for genomic and proteomic alterations in cancer and come up with potential personalized treatment options for patients.

It does so by combining technologies such as DNA and RNA sequencing and proteomics –  the study of the way proteins interact with one another – to create a molecular profile of a patient’s cancer. Whole genome sequencing of a patient’s matched tumor sample pinpoints tumor-related alterations at the DNA level, RNA sequencing confirms mutations in DNA, proteomics measures the levels of proteins involved in tumor growth, and integrative analysis identifies disrupted pathways that are specific to the patient’s tumor.

The company also offers its GPS Cancer test, which is a first-of-its-kind test that integrates whole genome sequencing, whole transcriptome sequencing, and quantitative proteomics. GPS Cancer provides oncologists with a comprehensive molecular profile of a patient’s cancer to inform personalized treatment strategies, thereby helping to optimize patient care.

NantOmics last received funding worth $250.8 million in a series A round a decade ago.

Nucleome Therapeutics

The University of Oxford spinout Nucleome Therapeutics has developed a platform comprising a suite of integrated laboratory and machine learning technologies that are capable of identifying the full complexity of the regulatory genome at base-pair level of resolution, 1000s of genes and genetic variants at a time. 

With a goal to address critical challenges in drug discovery and development, the platform is designed to boost drug target discovery and the development of precision medicines. It seeks to map genetic interactions to link disease-associated variants with gene regulation and employs AI to replicate and enhance lab experiments in order to monitor complex 3D genomic interactions.

At present, Nucleome’s focus is on conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, inflammatory bowel disease, and multiple sclerosis, and looks to expand its pipeline in the future.

The British startup is backed by funders such as M Ventures, the venture capital arm of Merck KGaA, Johnson and Johnson Innovation-JJDC, the venture capital arm of Pfizer, Pfizer Ventures, and British Patient Capital. It snapped up £37.5 million ($46.62 million) in a series A funding round held in 2022 to develop its autoimmune disease programs and power the expansion of its dark genome atlas – the part of the human genome that is yet to be well-understood.

Ultima Genomics

Another California-based company, Ultima Genomics is engaged in genome sequencing for which it uses its proprietary UG 100 Sequencer. The machine replaces complex and expensive flow cells in efforts to cut costs and increase performance and scalability. Launched last year, it is the company’s first product and features an open silicon wafer for high throughput. 

It allows for 24/7 run automation, flexibility for smaller and significantly faster runs, and an extreme accuracy mode for somatic applications and rare event detection. One of its applications is germline variant calling, which unlocks the DNA code to help understand unique genetic variations that are passed down from generation to generation.

Moreover, with the UG 100, tumor profiling is possible. And so is RNA sequencing, which is a useful tool for measuring gene expression levels.

In fact, UG 100 was nominated to be part of the UK Biobank Pharma Proteomics Project earlier this month. It will be used along with Thermo Fisher Scientific’s Olink Explore HT proteomics platform to better identify disease progression and improve precision therapeutics. The aim of the project is to evaluate more than 5,400 protein markers across 600,000 samples, including those from half a million UK Biobank participants. 

Last year, the company collaborated with Labcorp to use its sequencing technology to conduct whole genome sequencing. This will be leveraged to create therapies for patients with early-stage solid tumor cancers.

Variant Bio 

Situated in Washington in the U.S., Variant Bio is a biotech startup, which specializes in genomic discovery. The young company has a platform that integrates whole genome sequencing with deep phenotyping and multi-omics to identify genetically validated targets. It is built to scale and uses modern cloud software frameworks. It also incorporates machine learning and AI to expedite drug development.

Born out of its platform technology is the company’s pipeline, which targets a number of therapeutic areas. Its most advanced candidate is a small molecule in the lead optimization stage being evaluated to treat fibrosis. Its other candidate is also in the preclinical stage to address inflammation and it has two other undisclosed candidates for kidney disease.

It has partnered with institutes and universities across the globe, including Madagascar, South Africa, Uganda, India, Indonesia, New Zealand, and French Polynesia, to name a few.  

Just this month, it forged a $50 million deal with Danish pharma giant Novo Nordisk to gain a deeper understanding of the relationship between genetic variation and metabolism to yield drug targets to treat metabolic diseases such as diabetes and obesity.

Genomics startups initiative launched; market value on the rise

The global genomics market was valued at $42.4 billion in 2023 and is projected to hit $66.8 billion by 2029, according to a report by MarketsandMarkets. The venture firm Illumina Ventures, which is in a strategic partnership with the DNA giant Illumina, set up an accelerator program last year for biotech startups to advance in the genomics space – from early-stage genomics startups to company formation through series A financing. The company has invested in more than 30 U.S. and European startups since 2016.