Pharmaceutical firm Eli Lilly participated in a $56.1m series B round for Strateos, a US-based operator of remotely controlled laboratory facilities, on Tuesday.
The round was co-led by venture capital firms DCVC and Lux Capital and included Ally Bridge Group, Black Diamond Ventures, Mack & Co and Castor Ventures.
Strateos has built two automated laboratory facilities that can be remotely controlled through software and which contain advanced robotics and scientific instruments. Its SmartLab Platform is used by life sciences researchers and scientists can conduct experiments from any location.
The company was established in 2019 through the merger of Transcriptic, the developer of a robotic, cloud-based research lab platform, and 3Scan, a provider of automation, machine learning and computer vision software. It raised $16.5m from undisclosed investors in July 2019, according to a regulatory filing.
DCVC (then known as Data Collective) led a $13.4m series A-1 round for Transcriptic in 2016 that also featured pharmaceutical firm WuXi AppTec, Digital Science and AME Cloud Ventures.
Transcriptic received $8.5m from investors including Data Collective, AME Cloud, IA Ventures, Silicon Valley Bank, 500 Startups, MITS Fund and assorted angel investors the previous year. GV, a subsidiary of internet and technology conglomerate Alphabet, had joined IA Ventures in a $2.8m round in 2014.
The 2014 round came after the company had collected $1.2m in a 2013 seed round led by GV, with participation from Data Collective, Boost.vc and AME Cloud Ventures.