Startup Spotlight: Benchling’s R&D cloud platform
San Francisco-based Benchling offers cloud-based software for research and development in the life science and biotech industry.
The company’s unified applications include solutions known as Notebook, Molecular Biology, Registry, Inventory, and Request & Workflow Management.
Benchling said its customers include the largest pharmaceutical multinationals, as well as emerging biotech challengers, with names include Pfizer, Gilead, Sana and Regeneron. Altogether, over 230,000 scientists and 1,000 R&D organisations have utilised its platform
Since its foundation in 2012, the company has raised almost $112mn across six funding rounds. Its latest Series D round was announced at the end of May of this year, netting the company some $50mn from lead investor Alkeon Capital, alongside others include Thrive Capital, Spark Capital, Menlo Ventures, Lux Capital, ICONIQ Capital and Benchmark.
In a press release, Mark McLaughlin, general partner at Alkeon, said: "The disciplines of biopharma and biotech will create solutions that address some of our generation's biggest challenges, from COVID-19 and various forms of cancer to other serious threats to our welfare. Benchling has engineered an end-to-end, purpose-built software platform indispensable to life sciences companies leading the charge on global R&D. Scientists on the front lines of groundbreaking research leverage Benchling as go-to infrastructure that empowers them to innovate and collaborate at scale, while doing so with unprecedented speed and accuracy."
With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic focusing the world’s minds on discover potential vaccines, the company highlighted the part it could play.
Saji Wickramasekara, CEO and founder of Benchling, said: "Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, biotechnology is in the global spotlight like never before. We are proud that so many of our customers are relying on Benchling to develop diagnostics, treatments and vaccines with speed and precision.
“Rapidly solving COVID-19 is just the start of what will solidify this as the century of biotech. This funding enables us to bring that same speed to life science as a whole, no matter the research area – oncology, food and agriculture, energy, or materials. In particular, with our upcoming products to support chemistry-based R&D and chemically-modified biomolecules, Benchling will soon become a singular solution for all of life science."