Qkine Ltd, a manufacturer of animal-free, highly bioactive, and innovative proteins and growth factors for life science applications, announces the close of its oversubscribed funding raise, having secured £4.3M. The round, which was co-led by Parkwalk Advisors Ltd and Downing Ventures, attracted support from existing and new leading life science funds and angel investors. The investment will enable substantial scaling of manufacturing, R&D and commercial functions. Qkine combines proprietary protein production process development with protein engineering techniques to develop unique and exceptionally high-purity products that tackle fundamental biological and scale-up challenges for the fast-growing stem cell, organoid, regenerative medicine, and cellular agriculture sectors. This round will allow the company to further scale manufacturing capacity to meet increasing customer demand, including relocating early in 2023 to a newly re-fit state-of-the-art facility in Cambridge, UK. The new HQ will provide agile lab and office spaces for research and process development, plus a dedicated β-lactam-free and animal-free manufacturing suite. In addition, the round has cemented a collaborative partnership with the UK government catapult, Centre for Process Innovation, to accelerate process development and achieve maximum yields of key products. Read more