Three winners of the m4 Award pre-founding competition have been successful. The Munich-based start-ups INVITRIS and Smartbax have received funding as part of INCATE. They want to find solutions against antibiotic resistances that are increasing worldwide and threatening health. The Knowing01 team has been awarded the Women TechEU grant, which aims to support women-led startups in cutting-edge technology.
More than one million people die each year due to illnesses caused by drug-resistant pathogens. New approaches to combat resistant bacteria are therefore urgently needed. INCATE (INCubator for Antibacterial Therapies in Europe) is an initiative that supports innovative early-stage companies in the fight against drug-resistant bacterial infections. Four companies have now been selected to receive funding and advice to support their development of novel antibiotic therapies. Up to 10,000 euros in funding is available to each company.
Against drug-resistant pathogens: funding for INVITRIS and Smartbax
Two of them come from Munich and have also already won the pre-founding competition m4 Award, which is endowed with a total of 2.5 million euros:
INVITRIS uses bacteriophages for the therapy of antibiotic-resistant infections and has developed a special technology with which it is possible for the first time to produce genetically optimized bacteriophages in vitro for the therapy of antibiotic-resistant infections.
Smartbax is a spin-off of the Technical University of Munich and was founded in April 2021. The start-up is developing novel antibacterial compounds against multidrug-resistant bacteria and difficult-to-treat biofilms.
In addition to these two promising approaches, funding was also awarded to VIRI with an antivirulent molecule against Gram-negative bacteria and Myxobiotics, a spin-off of the Helmholz Center for Infection Research (HZI) with a molecule inspired by natural products against carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii infections, which can cause severe pneumonia.
Women TechEU grant for Knowing01
Knowing01, a spin-off of the Institute of Computational Biology at Helmholtz Zentrum München, can also announce a success. Founded in early 2020, the start-up has developed software for processing Big Data to identify biomarkers and drug targets for personalized therapies.
Now it has been awarded the Women TechEU grant. With this funding program, the European Commission supports deep-tech start-ups led by women. Indeed, only 15 percent of innovative start-ups are founded or co-founded by women and only 6 percent have exclusively female founding teams. Women TechEU aims to close this gender innovation gap by providing financial support with grants of 75,000 euros each and coaching and mentoring through the EIC's Women Leadership program.
About the m4 Award
With the m4 Award, initiated by BioM in 2011, the Free State of Bavaria promotes innovative products, technologies or services of young companies that decisively advance the development of medicine of the future. The prize is awarded every other year. In the five rounds of competition so far, a total of 25 research projects have received awards. Nine spin-offs have been realized since then.