Cyntellect Raises $15.5M as it Expands Biotech Instrument Business

San Diego-based Cyntellect , which makes work stations used by biotechs for cell analysis, purification, and processing, has raised $15.5 million so far in a secondary round that aims to raise a total of $18.6 million, according to a recent regulatory filing.

Cyntellect says its instruments are used in life sciences research, biopharmaceutical production, stem cell research, and drug discovery. The company says its cytometers provide scientists with rapid, high-quality imaging and analysis of cells in every well of a 384-well microplate array. Cyntellect says its instruments can scan an entire well while maintaining consistent illumination for accurate cell identification from the center to the well edge. The company’s product line also includes an automated system for cultivating cell lines used in biopharmaceutical manufacturing.

The current venture round consists of equity investments and convertible warrants, according to the filing. Cyntellect was founded in 1997, and earlier investors in the company include Bru II Venture Capital Fund, Iceland Genomics Ventures, Sigma-Aldrich, Sumitomo, and Third Security, according to VentureWire.

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.