BioWorld International Correspondent

Personal Chemistry AB added SEK290 million (US$31.6 million) to its coffers in a fourth financing round supported primarily by existing shareholders.

One of them, HealthCap, acted as lead investor, while 3i plc, of London, Investor Growth Capital and SEB Foeretagsinvest, both of Stockholm, Sweden, also participated. The deal attracted two new investors, SEB Fonder, of Stockholm, and MVI SA, of Nyon, Switzerland.

The Uppsala, Sweden-based company, which has raised SEK500 million in total funding to date, did not disclose the valuation attached to the transaction. Chief Financial Officer Frederik Ohrn positioned it as a pre-IPO round, although it has no immediate plans to seek a listing. "It is working capital. We're looking to this money to take us to profit," he told BioWorld International, adding that should come around "the tail end of next year."

Personal Chemistry is insulated from the current weak funding climate for biotechnology companies in Europe as it is an instrumentation rather than a drug discovery company. Its Coherent Synthesis platform automates and accelerates many of the tasks involved in medicinal and combinatorial chemistry by combining proprietary techniques with chemistry informatics software, robotic liquid handling and microwave technology.

"We are a company with sales," Ohrn said. "There is no uncertainty about the functionality of our product."

The U.S. has been the company's most successful market to date, Ohrn said, but the European market is beginning to pick up, particularly in Germany, the UK and Sweden. "The key thing for this company right now is to roll out the Coherent Synthesis product line into the market."

It posted an almost fivefold increase in sales last year, to SEK69.2 million. Its target this year is to double that figure. "We are on plan," Ohrn said.

So far, its has focused most of its sales efforts on the pharmaceutical industry. It has a presence in 17 of the world's top 20 pharmaceutical companies. Its primary target audience comprises the 22,000 chemists working in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors.

"Obviously, we have just scratched that market," Ohrn said. "Our penetration in the industry is still very small." The company has installed more than 100 Coherent Synthesis systems.