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Expanding the applicability of bacterial fermentation for biomanufacturing could help significantly reduce the cost and time for manufacture of many important therapeutic peptides and proteins. Vectron Biosolutions is leading the charge in revolutionizing protein production with its advanced VB Secretion technology. By combining this innovation with its proprietary expression platform, VB Expression, Vectron has developed a platform capable of producing complex and valuable biomolecules in Escherichia coli and efficiently secreting them into the extracellular media — drastically simplifying downstream purification processes. Since its initial proof of concept, the company has achieved several key milestones, successfully producing a range of high-value therapeutic peptides and proteins. As Vectron collaborates with biopharma partners, it continues to push the boundaries of bacterial fermentation, moving steadily toward commercial readiness of this game-changing technology within the next two years.
Revolutionizing E. coli for Biomanufacturing: Unlocking the Power of Protein Secretion
E. coli is widely used for manufacturing certain therapeutic peptides and proteins due to its ability to deliver faster, more cost-effective production than cell culture–based solutions. However, one of the primary limitations of E. colisystems is that the expressed proteins are retained inside the cells, requiring extraction through cell lysis. This process introduces a range of cell-derived impurities that complicate downstream purification. Furthermore, many proteins tend to aggregate and form inclusion bodies (IBs) when produced intracellularly, which adds processing steps, increases costs, and often results in product loss.
The ability to engineer an E. coli system that can secrete proteins directly into the extracellular environment offers numerous advantages:
- Simplified downstream processing: By reducing cell-derived impurities, secretion streamlines purification, cutting both costs and processing times.
- Reduced cellular toxicity: Removing proteins from the cell decreases the risk of toxicity due to high expression levels, enabling greater overall productivity.
- Minimized protein aggregation: Secretion lowers the concentration of proteins within the cell, reducing IB formation and the associated costs and time required for refolding processes.
- Support for continuous processing: Secretion facilitates continuous processing methods like perfusion fermentation, which traditional E. coli systems cannot support due to their inability to export proteins.
These innovations expand the potential applications of E. coli fermentation for commercial-scale protein production, including proteins currently produced through more expensive methods or for emerging biotherapeutics. Beyond the biopharmaceutical industry, secretion technology has the potential to revolutionize protein production in sectors such as food, agriculture, and nutraceuticals, where cost-efficiency is especially critical. In these industries, profit margins are often smaller than in pharma, making low-cost manufacturing solutions like secretion-based systems particularly attractive. By reducing both upstream and downstream costs, secretion technology could enable companies in these fields to produce high-quality proteins more affordably, opening new possibilities for widespread, sustainable production.
VB Secretion Technology: Advancing Therapeutic Production in E. coli
In 2021, Vectron Biosolutions, building upon a portfolio of technologies created to optimize protein production in E coli, acquired a groundbreaking secretion technology from T3S Technologies. Originally developed by Professor Kelly Hughes and his team at the University of Utah, this system was designed for Salmonella, a bacterium currently undesired for pharmaceutical manufacturing. To overcome this limitation, Vectron adapted the platform for E. coli, a more established host for biopharmaceutical production, with the goal of enhancing protein secretion and broadening the use of bacterial fermentation in human therapeutic development.
Transitioning the technology from Salmonella to E. coli demanded significant engineering expertise. Extensive chromosomal modifications were necessary to enable efficient flagella-mediated secretion in E. coli, advancing Vectron’s platform as a robust solution for therapeutic protein production.
The controlled secretion technology utilizes engineered bacterial flagella — organelles that aid in bacterial cell movement — as highly specialized channels for protein secretion. This precise mechanism allows only the protein of interest to pass through the channel, ensuring controlled secretion directly into the surrounding media. Vectron’s VB Secretion Technology enables selective secretion of target proteins by attaching a tag recognized by the cell, ensuring that only the tagged protein passes through the secretion channels. While the intact, tagged proteins may be suitable for some uses, the removal of the tag is crucial for biotherapeutic applications due to immunogenicity concerns. Vectron is actively exploring various strategies for automated tag removal and anticipates selecting a primary method by the end of 2024. Further refinement will continue to optimize the chosen approach, as certain proteins may respond better to specific removal methods.
Key Milestones in VB Secretion Technology Development
Vectron Biosolutions achieved several key milestones in the development of its E. coli secretion platform. The first milestone was engineering new E. coli strains capable of synthesizing the appropriate flagella. Next, Vectron modified the host to improve the secretion efficiency. The third major milestone was achieving proof of concept by successfully detecting secreted proteins in the extracellular medium. The final milestone — a significant breakthrough — was the secretion of industrially valuable proteins.
Early studies at Vectron demonstrated the platform’s capacity to produce a variety of proteins, including beta-lactamase enzymes and therapeutic human growth hormone (hGH), using different engineered secretory E. colistrains. These studies achieved titers corresponding to excess of 100 mg/L in fed-batch processes. Subsequent generations of secretion strains have since shown improved secretion specificity and higher yields of a variety of other proteins.
Powered by VB Expression Technology
Today, Vectron’s VB Secretion Technology enables common industrial E. coli strains to synthesize flagella, which serve as channels for the directed transport of expressed proteins in a streamlined, one-step process. This system completely bypasses the periplasmic space, ensuring fast and efficient secretion. Each secretion channel can transport approximately 10,000 amino acids per second, a stark contrast to the Sec translocon, which translocates about 40 amino acids per second. Proteins are expressed using Vectron’s VB Expression technology, specifically designed to minimize the formation of IBs and generate soluble proteins — a critical requirement for successful secretion. By carefully controlling protein expression levels, Vectron maximizes yields of high-quality proteins, while fine-tuning the expression rate ensures proper protein folding.
Together, VB Expression and VB Secretion technologies form a highly complementary and advanced platform for bacterial fermentation. This integrated system allows for high-titer production of proteins with the right quality and quantity, efficiently secreted into the extracellular medium. The result is optimized upstream and downstream processes, reduced costs, and significantly shorter development timelines.
Significant Advances in Secretion Efficiency
Since achieving proof of concept for its VB Secretion technology, Vectron Biosolutions has demonstrated high-level secretion of many therapeutically valuable proteins and peptides, including GLP-1, insulin, GLP-2, somatotropin, glucagon, and others. Some of these examples are detailed in Table 1. Continued engineering of secretory E. coli strains has led to more versatile and scalable solutions, enabling ever higher titers with each new generation. Vectron’s ongoing R&D efforts focus on continuously enhancing the platform to support high-density, scalable production of therapeutically important proteins, improving both its flexibility and applicability for commercial manufacturing.
The proteins listed in Table 1 represent a range of peptides and proteins of varying sizes (up to 80 kilodaltons) and complexities. These results demonstrate the wide applicability of VB Secretion technology for producing both therapeutically and industrially relevant molecules, underscoring its versatility.
In parallel, Vectron has initiated the development of a sophisticated in silico model designed to predict the secretability of different proteins. While still in its early stages, this model has already proven useful for identifying many proteins and peptides that have been experimentally confirmed as efficiently secreted, helping refine the technology for broader use.
Table 1. Non-confidential proteins and peptides shown to be efficiently secreted with VB Secretion
Note: The molecules in Table 1 have successfully been secreted fused to our proprietary secretion tags. For many of these molecules, the secreted titers correspond to several grams per liter in fed-batch processes
Refining the Predictive Model for Protein Secretion
Proteins vary widely in their properties — such as size, hydrophobicity, and other structural factors — and as such it is expected that some will be secreted more efficiently than others. Vectron’s predictive model based on multivariate analysis was designed to evaluate a protein’s likelihood of successful secretion using VB Secretion technology, considering a range of parameters. While the model is not yet fully optimized, it has already proven effective in assessing therapeutic proteins currently on the market, offering insights into whether they are likely to be secreted.
As more experimental data on protein secretion is generated, it is fed back into the model, allowing for continuous improvement via machine learning. This iterative process will enhance the model’s accuracy over time, making it an increasingly reliable tool for predicting the secretability of a wide range of proteins.
Enabling Continuous Fermentation for Greater Efficiency
Perfusion cultivation, a specific type of continuous processing, has become increasingly popular for biologics production using cell culture. This approach offers numerous advantages by enabling the continuous harvesting of protein products, allowing for smaller production footprints and longer process durations to achieve the same product output. Moreover, it may deliver higher product quality and yields by maintaining a steady, optimal state that minimizes impurity generation. Unfortunately, these benefits have not been available for traditional E. colifermentation processes, as the proteins expressed by the cells remain trapped inside, preventing continuous harvesting.
Vectron’s VB Expression and VB Secretion technologies aim to change that by facilitating high-performance perfusion fermentation. This approach eliminates the need for harvesting, lysing cells, and downstream purification after every upstream process cycle. Instead, the fermentation can continue for days or even weeks. This innovation not only lowers the cost of goods compared to batch fermentation but also reduces cellular toxicity and protein aggregation (including the formation of IBs) by avoiding high concentrations of over-expressed proteins. As a result, cell viability and productivity improve significantly.
To achieve this, Vectron is partnering with U.S.-based Scarab Genomics to engineer genetically stable E. colistrains optimized for perfusion fermentation. Early results by Scarab have shown protein production sustained for nearly 60 days — approximately 20 times longer than typical E. coli strains. By combining this breakthrough with VB Secretion technology, it is expected that perfusion fermentation processes could be extended over multiple weeks, offering tremendous value for therapeutic protein production.
Building Success Together: Vectron’s Approach to Partnership
While challenges remain on the path to commercializing VB Secretion Technology, Vectron is making substantial progress in reshaping protein production through E. coli fermentation. The next steps in this journey are clearly mapped out, and confidence in achieving these goals is bolstered by the successes realized so far.
A significant portion of this progress is the result of close collaborations with customers. These partnerships have provided Vectron with additional data and practical insights that go beyond internal R&D, allowing for the fine-tuning of platform efficiency, yield optimization, and expanded application capabilities. Vectron is eager to continue working with new therapeutic protein developers to explore cost- and time-efficient fermentation-based manufacturing processes.
It is also worth noting that VB Expression and VB Secretion technologies are not limited to therapeutic protein production. These platforms can be applied across various industries, including food and beverage, nutraceuticals, and agriculture/feed. While Vectron primarily collaborates with biopharmaceutical companies, its technologies offer significant potential for reducing the cost of goods in a wide range of industrial protein production scenarios.
One Step Closer to Realizing E. coli 2.0
The advancements achieved so far with the VB Secretion technology — and the promising progress on the horizon — position Vectron Biosolutions to help the biopharmaceutical industry, and beyond, unlock the transformative potential of E. coli 2.0. This groundbreaking platform is poised to revolutionize protein production through bacterial fermentation, with broad applications across multiple industries.
As Vectron continues to push the boundaries of what E. coli can achieve, the technology is progressing well beyond proof-of-concept, evolving into a viable, cost-effective solution for commercial-scale production of diverse proteins. The journey is far from over, and with each step, Vectron draws closer to bringing this game-changing solution to market. We invite you to stay tuned as we continue to share updates, explore new partnerships, and reveal the next stages of this exciting endeavor.
Elevating Microbial Protein Production for Scientific Advancements
We are proud to announce the expansion of our service offerings, aimed at optimizing every facet of microbial protein production for the scientific community.
Our comprehensive suite of advanced services is tailored to address the evolving needs of researchers, providing impactful solutions across various stages of the production process. At the foundation of this pivotal expansion lies Vectron's profound expertise in the development of outstanding bacterial strains.
1️⃣ Enzyme Evolution and Screening: Evaluate evolved enzyme activity and characterize new variants for improved enzymatic processes.
2️⃣ Strain Development and Screening: Establish and identify optimized recombinant protein-producing strains utilizing Vectron’s unique expression platform.
3️⃣ Fermentation: Seamlessly scale up to industrially relevant high cell density cultivation conditions, progressing from bench to pilot scale for efficient fermentation processes.
4️⃣ Upstream Process Characterization: Conduct in-depth analysis of metabolites, nutrients, online data, substrate/medium optimization, and by-product identification for a robust upstream process.
5️⃣ Purification/Protein Quality Assessment: Isolate the protein of interest at bench- and prep-scale, including evaluating endotoxin levels, host DNA, metals, etc., ensuring high-quality protein.
6️⃣ Protein Analysis: Rigorously assess product quality, covering intact mass, glycan and disulfide bond profiling. In-vitro characterization includes activity, binding affinity, anti-microbial, anti-fungal, and anti-viral activity, along with titer determination.
- This partnership will give the industry new, more efficient options for E. coli-expressed products across many indications of drug development.
- Cytovance’s expansion of E. coli technologies and strains enables them to meet customers' needs for a one-of-a-kind approach to executing technical microbial projects.
- International deal allows Vectron to bring its technology to the North American Market and expand its global partnership network.
OKLAHOMA CITY & TRONDHEIM, Norway-Cytovance Biologics announced today a strategic, international collaboration with Vectron Biosolutions to add customized E. coli strain development to the CDMO’s microbial program.
“As one of North America’s leading microbial manufacturing service providers, we are very excited to collaborate with the team at Vectron Biosolutions! Their extensive expertise in gene expression for industrial protein production and our shared cultures of ingenuity, make them an excellent partner to support our customers looking to overcome large molecule obstacles and reach their clinical and commercial milestones,” said Cytovance CCO, Axel Schleyer.
E. coli has rapidly gained a reputation for being a fast and cost-effective option for expressing complex molecules, but not all proteins are the same. As an increasing number of promising novel drug targets are discovered, many difficult-to-express and harder-to-produce compounds are reaching and subsequently failing in the development phase, demanding a new generation of unique microbial manufacturing solutions.
At the head of providing new solutions for complex customer projects is Cytovance’s Senior Director of Research and Development, Stephanie Wickham, Ph.D., “Due to the complexities of drug discovery, our customers have already invested countless hours and resources into their compound by the time we have a kick-off call. As a trusted CDMO partner, expanding our toolbox of available strains to include those specifically engineered to address the complexities of their large molecule and accommodate the challenges of long-term scale-up to one of our 1000L fermenters, is a natural next step for our program.”
Leveraging Vectron’s solutions Cytovance will be able to offer customers planning to express in E. coli higher titers, with reduced downstream costs and processing time using Vectron’s unique vector engineering expression and secretion technology platforms, and the full documentation of development work needed for regulatory approval. Altogether, this will simplify and accelerate drug development efforts, propelling new products from concept to commercialization and on to patients in need.
This partnership will serve as one of Vectron’s first expansions of business into the United States, following the company’s acquisition of T3S Technologies' secretion platform in 2021. Vectron CEO and Co-founder, Trond Erik Vee Aune is looking forward to this extension of the company’s global partnership network and shared that, "We are very excited to partner with Cytovance Biologics to bring Vectron's superior strain development services to customers in the USA. Cytovance's position as a strong microbial CDMO is highly complementary to Vectron's next-generation vector engineering technologies for microbial strain development, and together we will offer a complete package from gene to product, enabling customers to advance their proteins to the clinic and the market sooner and at lower cost."
In addition, Vectron’s customers will have the option to seamlessly transition their expressed protein to downstream development with Cytovance, a trusted cGMP partner.
Dr. Schleyer will represent Cytovance at CPHI in Barcelona this October. If you are interested in scheduling a meeting to discuss your custom biomanufacturing needs, please visit https://info.cytovance.com/en-us/cphi2023.
About Cytovance Biologics:
Cytovance® Biologics is a leading biopharmaceutical Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO) offering ingenuity and integrated development services to support large molecule biologics throughout the journey from R&D to regulatory approval. These services include mammalian cell line development, cell banking, microbial strain development, process and analytical development, process characterization, and cGMP manufacturing. The company's 140,000+ sq. ft. state-of-the-art facilities in America’s Heartland are designed to meet US, EU, and global regulatory requirements.
Find out more at https://cytovance.com
About Vectron Biosolutions:
Vectron Biosolutions is a leading strain development service provider leveraging its proprietary, next-generation expression technologies and extensive experience to engineer bespoke bacterial strains for each and every customer protein. Providing unique solutions to unique problems is how Vectron approaches protein production challenges. The strains result in optimal maximal titers of biologically active protein. Vectron’s proprietary technologies, in-house expertise and decades of experience enable robust protein production and scalability otherwise not possible.
Find out more at https://www.vectronbiosolutions.com.
Contacts
Media Contact
Savannah Worcester, on behalf of Cytovance Biologics
savannah.worcester@themarketelement.com
Someone is sending out emails to people, claiming to be from the HR department of Vectron, and encouraging them to apply for an available data job through downloading an app. This is a scam attempt. There are no open positions at Vectron at the moment. Any available positions will be listed on our webpage and through normal channels.
Jostein Malmo, Vectron's CSO, has co-authored a research article in Frontiers in Chemical Engineering that broadens our understanding of E. coli central metabolite status as the cells synthesize recombinant proteins.
Using four targeted CapIC- and LC-MS/MS methods, covering over 60 metabolites, the researchers performed an in-depth metabolite profiling of the effects of high-level recombinant protein production in strains derived from E. coli BL21, carrying XylS/Pm vectors with different characteristics. The mass-spectrometric central carbon metabolite profiling was complemented with the study of growth kinetics and protein production in batch bioreactors. The work shows the robustness in E. coli central carbon metabolism when introducing increased plasmid copy number, as well as the greater importance of induction of recombinant protein production as a metabolic challenge, especially when strong promoters are used.
Read the article here: Frontiers | Central carbon metabolite profiling reveals vector-associated differences in the recombinant protein production host Escherichia coli BL21 (frontiersin.org)
Companies announce plans to create the next-generation of animal-free proteins through precision fermentation.
BOSTON, Oct. 20, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Motif FoodWorks, the Boston-based food technology company making plant-based food better tasting and more nutritious, today announced a partnership with Vectron Biosolutions, a microbial strain development and protein production company. Building upon their existing partnership, the two companies will work together to develop the next generation of animal-free proteins through precision fermentation.
Motif will use Vectron's deep expertise in strain development and their proprietary gene expression technologies to create food-technologies that improve the taste and texture of dairy alternatives, as well as to improve the nutrition levels of plant-based foods. These projects are the result of the companies' ongoing work over the past 2 years.
"Precision fermentation has the capability to create better tasting, more sustainable food-tech that can radically change plant-based foods for the better," said Dr. Philippe Prochasson, vice president of Biosciences and Analytics at Motif FoodWorks. "We've been impressed with Vectron's cutting-edge capabilities, including their unique expression systems, and look forward to exploring new ways to create breakthrough animal-free proteins together."
Vectron's precision fermentation system, which includes bioinformatics tools for protein discovery and engineering as well as an evolutionary approach to strain development, adds another impactful method for Motif's range of food-tech products. Motif is "platform agnostic" when it comes to the creation of its products. This means that some of its food-tech, like HEMAMI™, is produced through precision fermentation. While other products, such as its alternative meat texture enhancer APPETEX™, are created through innovations in platform areas like materials science that are non-precision fermentation based.
"Collaborating with Motif as they create the next wave of alternative proteins has opened doors for Vectron," said Trond Erik Vee Aune, CEO of Vectron Biosolutions. "Our company has historically been focused on the pharmaceutical space, so breaking into the food sector with Motif has been a welcome – and tasty – change."
About Motif FoodWorks
Motif FoodWorks makes plant-based foods so desirable that people actually crave them. Motif provides companies with a range of food technologies and finished food forms, from solutions for meat and dairy alternatives to experiences that inspire new categories. By pioneering breakthrough approaches to food science and the culinary arts, Motif is pushing the boundaries of what's possible in plant-based foods – delivering innovations for taste, texture and nutrition that benefit people and the planet. For more information, visit www.madewithmotif.com.
About Vectron Biosolutions
Vectron Biosolutions is on a mission to leverage outstanding microbial technologies and know-how to support researchers and manufacturers in realizing higher success rates, greater yields, and reduced cost of goods when developing and producing proteins.
Find out more at https://www.vectronbiosolutions.com.
Media Contacts
Julia Dacri
Motif FoodWorks
Jdacri@motiffoodworks.com
We are delighted to introduce Vectron's new Chief Commercial Officer, Dominik Bahiense de Mello.
Dominik joins Vectron with multiple years of experience in the life sciences industry with a special focus on sales, key account management and strategy development. He most recently held positions at Sartorius, the mother company of the Korean branch with which Vectron has an exclusive distribution agreement.
Welcome to the team, Dominik. We are excited to have you on board!
We are proud to announce that we have now achieved the first proof-of-concept for secretion using VB Secretion in E. coli.
The result came with one of our model proteins and the POC demonstrates that the VB Secretion platform has the potential to be used for secretion of industrial proteins in E. coli. Our next steps will be to validate secretion of more targets and modalities and increase the secretion rates as much as possible.
In April 2022, Sartorius Korea Biotech Co. became Vectron's exclusive agent in the Republic of Korea.
The ROK is a blooming hotspot for biotech and pharma and Vectron is excited to enter a partnership with a company that through decades has established a very strong position and become a key player in this valuable market.
With this deal, Korean biotech and pharma companies will get easier access to Vectron's next-generation technologies and services for production of recombinant proteins which will help them bring their products to market at lower cost and with less time.
At this conference celebrated in Portugal last week, a wide range of interesting topics were discussed. But we found of special interest several great talks demonstrating new possibilities within strain development and cultivation strategies for microbial protein production.
Jostein Malmo, Vectron's CSO, mentioned that he particularly enjoyed the presentations of Danielle Tullman-Ercek (Northwestern University), Erik Nordwald (KBI Biopharma), Patrick Stargardt (enGenes Biotech GmbH.), Charlie Cooney (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Drew Tack (Absci).
And we decided that Vectron Biosolutions AS will attend to the next one.See you in two years!
David Alvaro interviewed Trond Erik Vee Aune from Pharma's Almanac about the evolution of Vectron Biosolutions, starting from our first innovative microbial expression vector technology to today's cutting-edge technology portfolio for microbial recombinant protein production.
In the interview, Aune discusses how Vectron's evolutionary approach to strain design and the company's revolutionary secretion technology will transform tomorrow's drug production.
"What does unique solutions to unique problems mean" is the first question from the campaign marketing manager of the leading partnering firm for the global life science industry. To listen to the answer and the rest of the interview, watch this 5 minutes video.
This time, not in our area of expertise, the protein production, but for the design of our new website instead. Nonetheless, we are extremely happy to have received an award from such a prestigious organisation that discovers and recognises the talent and effort of the world's best web designers, developers, and agencies.
All we can say is thanks to LIFT Agency, which helped us to bring our vision and ideas to light.
We are proud to announce the launch of our newly redesigned website. The new site features a modern design, improved functionality, and easy access to essential information, our innovative and proprietary technologies, our CDMO services for tomorrow's proteins and much more.
The site's purpose is to help clients - any company or research group looking for optimal microbial production strains for their proteins- find us easily and facilitate the first contact with us.
On our new website, partners can access the latest articles and studies that our scientists publish as well as industry and company-related news. We also post about upcoming events which we will be attending.
We hope you like it as much as we do.
Vectron Biosolutions to Boost Protein Production Offering with Acquisition of Secretion Platform from T3S Technologies and $2.7M Series A Financing Round
TRONDHEIM, Norway, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Vectron Biosolutions, upstream experts providing expression tools and services in biomanufacturing, announced today it has raised $2.7 million in a Series A financing round led by Dynamk Capital as well as the acquisition of a bacterial secretion platform from Utah based T3S Technologies. The acquisition of T3S Technologies' secretion platform combined with Vectron's core expression technology and additional financing will significantly boost Vectron's position as a leading partner to biomanufacturers looking to reduce costs associated with the production of recombinant proteins or for solutions to advance their challenging proteins to the market.
"The acquisition of T3S' secretion platform strengthens our position as a leading provider of solutions to life science industries. High-level expression followed by true secretion of proteins comprise a paradigm shift in bacterial protein manufacture and is expected to become a future industry standard", said Trond Erik Vee Aune, CEO of Vectron Biosolutions. "We are immensely excited to be joined by Reinhard Vogt and the Dynamk team, who through their long experience and proven ability to successfully grow biomanufacturing companies, has recognized the great potential in Vectron."
Biomanufacturers are looking to reduce costs associated with the production of recombinant proteins by increasing titers and improving protein solubility. Vectron has developed proprietary expression tools to enable robust, cost-efficient production processes for recombinant proteins in E. coli and other bacteria.
"The T3S secretion technology together with Vectron's expression technology provides customers with a unique platform for the growing demand for microbial expression systems in order to significantly reduce cost of goods", said Reinhard Vogt, Venture Partner at Dynamk Capital.
With the closing of a Series A round with Dynamk Capital, Vectron adds Reinhard Vogt and Trond Erik Vee Aune as new board members.
Vectron Biosolutions to Boost Protein Production Offering with Acquisition of Secretion Platform from T3S Technologies and $2.7M Series A Financing Round.
TRONDHEIM, Norway, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Vectron Biosolutions, upstream experts providing expression tools and services in biomanufacturing, announced today it has raised $2.7 million in a Series A financing round led by Dynamk Capital as well as the acquisition of a bacterial secretion platform from Utah based T3S Technologies. The acquisition of T3S Technologies' secretion platform combined with Vectron's core expression technology and additional financing will significantly boost Vectron's position as a leading partner to biomanufacturers looking to reduce costs associated with the production of recombinant proteins or for solutions to advance their challenging proteins to the market.
"The acquisition of T3S' secretion platform strengthens our position as a leading provider of solutions to life science industries. High-level expression followed by true secretion of proteins comprise a paradigm shift in bacterial protein manufacture and is expected to become a future industry standard", said Trond Erik Vee Aune, CEO of Vectron Biosolutions. "We are immensely excited to be joined by Reinhard Vogt and the Dynamk team, who through their long experience and proven ability to successfully grow biomanufacturing companies, has recognized the great potential in Vectron."
Biomanufacturers are looking to reduce costs associated with the production of recombinant proteins by increasing titers and improving protein solubility. Vectron has developed proprietary expression tools to enable robust, cost-efficient production processes for recombinant proteins in E. coli and other bacteria.
"The T3S secretion technology together with Vectron's expression technology provides customers with a unique platform for the growing demand for microbial expression systems in order to significantly reduce cost of goods", said Reinhard Vogt, Venture Partner at Dynamk Capital.
About Vectron Biosolutions AS
Founded in 2008, Vectron Biosolutions AS supplies the life science industry with superior technologies and solutions for robust and cost-efficient production of recombinant proteins in E. coli and other bacteria through a combination of experienced life science researchers, state-of-the-art laboratory facilities, a proprietary technology platform and skillful management. Please visit vectronbiosolutions.com for more information.
About Dynamk Capital
Dynamk Capital is a growth equity and venture capital firm focused on life sciences industrials. Dynamk's investment strategy is centered on identifying companies developing disruptive technologies, tools, and services that enable the full biopharma continuum across discovery, development, and manufacturing of biotherapeutics, including cell & gene therapies, and vaccines. The Dynamk team of experienced life science entrepreneurs, investors, advisors, and subject matter experts provides capital and strategic advice to entrepreneurs commercializing innovative life science technologies. Please visit dynamk.vc for more information.
Vectron's dual UTR technology has been granted patent protection by the European Patent Office.
This technology allows the design of synthetic 5'-UTR sequences for maximized transcription and translation, individually. A common problem when optimizing 5'-UTRs for elevated expression of recombinant proteins is that an increase in transcription negatively affects translation, and vice versa. By using the dual UTR technology, Vectron can optimize both transcription and translation irrespective of each other and as a result achieve much higher and predictable expression rates.
Vectron enters non-exclusive collaboration with Mycenax Biotech Inc. to offer a superior and complete solution for microbial production of therapeutic proteins.
Through this agreement, Vectron and Mycenax will assist customers throughout the drug development process, from pre-clinical strain development to commercial manufacture. It combines the best of two worlds, state-of-the-art strain development for modern NBEs and biosimilars with cost-efficient manufacture from an experienced CMO with a great track record.
A research grant for continued work on cost-efficient production of Fab therapeutic proteins has been received from NFR.
To build on exciting results and to further develop Vectron's expression technology platform for cost-efficient and robust production of Fabs and other antibody fragments, Vectron has received a substantial research grant from the Norwegian Research Council. The objective is to develop an expression platform that consistently result in >10 g/L of soluble Fabs. SINTEF will be project partner and utilize their extensive experience with fed-batch fermentation to help develop Fab production processes. The planned project is expected to start in the summer of 2019 and continue for four years.
Vectron Biosolutions and ArcticZymes have entered a non-exclusive license agreement for recombinant expression of enzymes.
The two companies have collaborated on two projects and the results have shown a high success rate on a large set of target enzymes in ArcticZymes' discovery pipeline and high yields in scaled-up production processes. This agreement allows for more efficient discovery of new enzymes and improved yields in manufacturing of ArcticZymes' products.
Vectron Biosolution was featured in Dagens Naeringsliv on July 24, as one of the most interesting biotech startups in Norway.
It is with great sadness we inform that Professor Svein Valla passed away on September 13 after a period of illness. As Professor at the Department of Biotechnology at NTNU, one of Svein's main research interests was protein synthesis in bacteria.
Through more than 40 publications in peer-reviewed journals, Svein greatly advanced our knowledge on the fundamental process of gene expression and protein synthesis in microorganisms. Almost as a byproduct of this basic research, Svein improved upon existing industrial tools for controlled production of proteins by developing an innovative new expression vector technology platform. To facilitate the commercialization of this technology, Svein took the initiative to founding Vectron Biosolutions and served as a Board member in the company for many years until his illness forced him to step down.
We remember Svein as a brilliant scientist with a great mind for details and overview. But even more, as a warm human being with various interests and a fantastic sense of humor.
The iGEM 2017 team is a group of eight NTNU (Norwegian University of Science and Technology) students working together on a research project where they aim to face the approaching challenge of antibiotics resistance by taking a closer look into the exciting area of phage-therapy.
Their goal is to develop an efficient way of selecting bacteriophages (a type of virus) for killing specific bacteria.
The team will present their achievements in Boston in November. Read more here.
Vectron Biosolution has been selected for the semifinal in the DNB Healthcare Prize 2016 that will take place at the Oslo Cancer Cluster Incubator on November 17. The company will compete with other strong healthcare companies in a 6 minute pitch in front of a jury.
After a successful feasibility study where Vectron's proprietary expression vector technology platform was used to develop a robust production process for the Candida antarctica CalB enzyme, Vectron and EnginZyme have today signed a license agreement.
EnginZyme AB is a Stockholm-based biocatalysis company and has now received the commercial rights to use Vectron's expression vector technology platform for manufacture of CalB for biocatalysis applications. This agreement includes the right to combine the CalB enzyme with EnginZyme's proprietary EziG immobilization matrix.
Our new advert that will be featured in the October and January issues of European Biopharmaceutical Review.
Carl-Aake Carlsson is appointed new Chairman of Vectron Biosolutions. The Board has also been strengthened by the additions of Tom Pike and Jan Håbrekke.
The company would like to thank Robert Wahren for his time in the Board. Robert has been with Vectron since the beginning and we wouldn't have been where we are today without his contributions.
Get to know our current board of directors and management in our about page
Vectron was featured in the June issue of Teknisk Ukeblad. NTB made a release based on the TU article which was then picked up by many Norwegian newspapers, including Adressa and Fedrelandsvennen.
Read the article: Norsk teknologi gjør det billigere å produsere medisiner
Vectron is featured in two articles in the Norwegian newspaper Adresseavisen.
Link to the articles: