Oxford ‘unicorn’ Nanopore secures £100m

12th December 2016

Handheld DNA sequencer developer Oxford Nanopore secures £100m in funding, valuing the company at £1.25bn.

Oxford Nanopore Technologies, the world’s only developer of portable DNA/RNA sequencers, has secured £100m in new funding.

Spun out of Oxford University by Oxford University Innovation in 2005, the company has gone on to raise £351m in external funding. Nanopore’s latest round was co-led by new investor GT Healthcare and existing backer Woodford Investment Management. The round was also joined in participation by other new and existing backers.

Already a member of billion-pound companies club to emerge from the Oxford tech cluster, the latest round now values Nanopore at £1.25bn.

Matt Perkins, Chief Executive Officer at Oxford University Innovation, said:

“From allowing NASA to successfully sequence DNA in microgravity for the first time to opening up wide-scale whole-genome sequencing in humans, Oxford Nanopore’s MinION DNA sequencer device is creating impact around the world and beyond.  This latest round is a vote of confidence by the investment community in Oxford Nanopore and a stamp of approval for innovation from Oxford, demonstrating its ability to generate billion-pound companies.”

For more information, please visit Oxford Nanopore Technologies.

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