The Munich-based start-up Onyx Biotech has closed a pre-seed funding round. Investors include Life Science Valley Wachstumsfonds, Freiraum Ventures, as well as several experienced business angels. With the fresh capital, the company—founded in September 2024 by brothers Florian and Gregor Essert—aims to make the development of modern biologics significantly more efficient, particularly in areas such as antibody purification, which is often considered a bottleneck in development today.
At the core of the solution are “digital twins”, designed to replace experimental steps with realistic simulations. According to the start-up, this can eliminate up to 96% of otherwise necessary lab experiments, reducing development cycles from months to just a few days. The technology was validated early on in real-world use together with industry partners. In the longer term, the platform is intended to help lower costs, save resources, and strengthen the competitiveness of biopharma development in Germany and Europe.
In its short time so far, the start-up has already been able to win over well-known industry partners in the biopharma sector (including a top-5 German biopharma company) and, together with them, demonstrate the impact of the solution.
The founders agree that their Munich location is what enabled them to get this far: “Munich’s start-up ecosystem has supported us immensely. Without the TUM, UnternehmerTUM, BayStartUP - to name just a few - we wouldn’t be where we are today.”