BRIEF—CTRL launches with $10 million seed financing

Chicago-based CTRL Therapeutics, a biotech company developing a cell therapy platform for solid tumors, today announced a $10 million seed financing led by General Catalyst with participation from Intermountain Health, FACIT and other investors.

Shana Kelley, founder and chief technology officer at CTRL, said: “The field of cell therapy has been limited by the lack of tools to isolate and expand tumor-reactive cells that are efficacious against solid tumors.

“This funding enables further optimization and validation of our proprietary technology platform and expansion of our team to support our mission to deliver curative therapies for all individuals living with cancer.”

CTRL claims to be building a platform with the potential to address the challenges of existing cell therapy technologies by extracting circulating tumor-reactive lymphocytes from blood, building on the advantages of tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte therapies while providing greater efficacy by improving the immune-phenotype, quality and consistency of therapeutic cells harvested.

It is hoped that this method may enable broader patient access by avoiding invasive and costly surgery, while delivering superior cost-effectiveness and simplified manufacturing.