5 million euros for Graph Therapeutics

Vienna-based biotech company Graph Therapeutics has increased its total funding to more than 10 million U.S. dollars. With a new funding round of five million U.S. dollars, the startup aims to accelerate its drug development in the field of inflammatory and immune-mediated diseases while further expanding its platform technology.

The Paris-based venture capital firm Daphni has joined the investor group. Existing investors such as SquareOne, Merantix Capital, and NAVEC Investment Management are also continuing to invest in the company. The funding is supplemented by public grants from the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG) and Austria Wirtschaftsservice (AWS).

TechBio Meets Immunology

Graph Therapeutics (GraphTx) operates at the intersection of biotechnology, artificial intelligence, and precision medicine. The company develops its own drug candidate programs for inflammatory and immune-mediated diseases, relying on a combination of modern cell models and machine learning.

The biotech company aims to better understand the complex mechanisms behind immune system dysfunctions in order to derive targeted new therapeutic approaches. To this end, the platform analyzes primary patient cells as well as extensive multi-omics data and identifies potential disease mechanisms, drug targets, and biomarkers.

From the Platform to Its Own Drug Pipeline

According to the company, the underlying technology has now reached a decisive stage of development. The platform has been sufficiently validated to not only deliver scientific insights but also directly support the company’s own drug development.

Graph Therapeutics is thus pursuing a strategy currently being adopted by many tech-bio companies: rather than exclusively licensing technology platforms, they are increasingly building their own drug programs to capture a larger share of value creation in the long term.

At the same time, the company continues to see potential for strategic partnerships and licensing agreements with the pharmaceutical industry.

Experience in AI-Driven Cancer Research

The founding team brings extensive experience in the field of AI-based precision medicine. The scientists previously played a key role in establishing the Austrian company Allcyte, which specialized in AI-driven precision oncology and was later acquired by the British tech-bio company Exscientia.

This experience is now being applied to the development of new therapies for inflammatory and immunological diseases. Graph relies on a so-called “Lab-in-the-Loop” approach, in which experimental data and AI models are continuously linked.

Investors see potential for the next generation of tech-bio companies

For new investor Daphni, Graph exemplifies a new generation of tech-bio companies in which technological innovation and biomedical research are closely intertwined.

In particular, the high complexity of immune-mediated diseases calls for new, integrated research approaches that combine modern AI methods with experimental biology.

Austria as a Deep-Tech Hub

In addition to private investors, Graph Therapeutics also benefits from Austrian innovation funding. The support provided by programs from the FFG and AWS underscores the importance of public funding for capital-intensive deep-tech and life-science companies.

With this recently completed round of financing, Graph Therapeutics aims to further advance its internal drug discovery programs and continue expanding its platform for the development of new precision medicines in the fields of inflammation and immunology.

The development of the Vienna-based startup also demonstrates how the boundaries between software, artificial intelligence, and drug development are increasingly blurring—and how this is giving rise to a new generation of tech-bio companies.