Bota Bio, a global industrial biotechnology company advancing sustainable biomanufacturing, today announced that it has raised more than $100 million in an oversubscribed Series B funding round. The financing was led by Sequoia Capital China. Other investors included previous backers Matrix Partners China, Source Code Capital, Sherpa Healthcare Partners, and 5Y Capital, among others. This Series B financing brings Bota Bio's total funding to $145 million to date.
The new funds will be used to expand the company's global operations and build out Bota Bio's lab-to-pilot scale platform to facilitate the rapid scale-up and deployment of the company's product pipeline in consumer goods, food, nutrition, and pharmaceutical products.
"Most traditional manufacturing comes with a high environmental cost. We are building Bota Bio to innovate solutions that help manufacturers in all industries leverage the power of biology to accelerate the design and scale-up of high-performance products using sustainable processes," said Cheryl Cui, Ph.D., co-founder and CEO, Bota Bio. "We are empowering a diverse global client base from different industries to develop bio-based alternatives to traditional ingredients. We are thrilled to have this syndicate of renowned investors support our efforts in transforming global manufacturing."
Bota Bio was founded in 2019 by a team of scientists and industry experts with proven track records in successfully developing and delivering industrial-scale bio-based products to market. The company has developed and deployed a technology platform known as the Bota Freeway that integrates advanced digital tools with lab automation. Bota Bio has also expanded synthetic biology's design-build-test-learn cycle to include downstream process development and select non-traditional microbial strains, accelerating the design and evolution of enzymes and cell-based factories.
Seth Yakatan
Known for solutions that yield results, Seth Yakatan has completed or advised on acquisitions and corporate finance transactions totaling over $3 billion. He is CEO of Katan Associates International—a financial strategy and merchant banking firm specializing in commercialization and asset monetization—especially those within life-science and e-commerce sectors.
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