Epitome Therapeutics Launches with 4 Million Euros

The Austrian biotechnology startup Epitome Therapeutics has secured a total of 4 million euros in funding to mark its official launch. The funding consists of an oversubscribed pre-seed round of 2 million euros and an additional 2 million euros in public grants. The company is developing a novel platform for the precise control of gene expression and aims to use it to enable new therapeutic approaches for genetic and complex diseases.

Strong Investors for a New Generation of Gene Regulation

The pre-seed financing was co-led by XISTA Science Ventures and Caesar Ventures. Navec Venture Holding GmbH also participated. Additional funds came from grant programs administered by Austria Wirtschaftsservice (AWS) and the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG).

With this capital, Epitome Therapeutics plans to advance its development programs through the selection of a first drug candidate, further expand its proprietary CADENCE platform, and grow its scientific and operational teams.

The successful completion of an oversubscribed funding round is a strong signal of the quality of our team and the potential of our technology.

Dr. Guido Gualdoni, CEO and Co-Founder of Epitome Therapeutics

A New Approach to Regulating Gene Expression

Epitome Therapeutics was founded in 2025 by Dr. Guido Gualdoni and Dr. Jamie Hackett as a spin-off of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Rome. The company focuses on the question of how genes can be precisely regulated—not merely turned on or off.

While many existing gene therapies aim to turn off defective genes, numerous diseases require the targeted restoration or fine-tuning of gene activity. This is precisely where the company’s proprietary CADENCE platform comes into play.

Genes don’t just need to be active or inactive—they need to be expressed at the right level.

Dr. Jamie Hackett, Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder of Epitome Therapeutics

Disruptions to this balance are the cause of numerous diseases.

Epigenome editing without altering the DNA

The CADENCE platform enables precise, long-term, and finely tuned gene activation without altering the actual DNA sequence. Instead, the technology targets the level of epigenetic regulation and utilizes a modular system of optimized epigenetic effectors. This is intended to achieve significantly higher precision, flexibility, and safety than with previous methods of gene activation. The company sees potential applications particularly in rare diseases and metabolic disorders.

Research from EMBL as the Foundation

The technological foundation of Epitome Therapeutics is based on research conducted at the EMBL in Rome. Part of this research was published as early as 2024 in a groundbreaking paper in *Nature Genetics *. The company holds exclusive licensing rights to the corresponding intellectual property rights held by the EMBL.

For investors, this is precisely what makes the company so attractive.“We were particularly impressed by the combination of scientific excellence and clear therapeutic applicability,” explains Alexander Schwartz of XISTA Science Ventures.

Epigenome editing is gaining momentum

Epitome Therapeutics is the latest European company to emerge in a field that is expected to grow significantly in importance in the coming years. While traditional gene-editing methods continue to face challenges regarding precision and safety, the targeted regulation of gene expression via epigenetic mechanisms opens up new therapeutic possibilities.

With its CADENCE platform, the Vienna-based company is positioning itself early on in a market segment that many researchers view as one of the next major stages of development in precision medicine.