PlaqueTec Raises $5 Million for Cardiovascular Disease Database Development

PlaqueTec has secured $5 million from its existing investor base to further develop its intracoronary liquid biopsy technology designed to identify cardiovascular disease (CVD) inflammatory drivers.

The investment will specifically support the continued build-out of PlaqueTec’s proprietary cardiovascular data lake, BioCarta, a growing repository of unique intracoronary proteomic and clinical data. BioCarta will provide a novel site-of-disease strategy to explain the way(s) inflammatory risk in CVD is stratified and targeted, providing more accurate disease assessments than current approaches and better informing targeted therapeutic interventions with potential to transform patient outcomes.

“The decision by our existing shareholders to reinvest, and to do so at a level that exceeded our target, speaks directly to their confidence in what PlaqueTec’s data is revealing about cardiovascular disease,” PlaqueTec Chairman Martin Stapleton stated. “We are building something genuinely differentiated: a high-resolution, intracoronary data asset that is poised to underpin the next generation of cardiovascular therapeutics. This round validates that strategy and gives us the runway to prove it.”

The BioCarta database contains proteomic data obtained from patient samples collected in the BIOPATTERN trial using PlaqueTec’s intracoronary liquid biopsy approach. Using the coronary concentration gradient, the liquid biopsy device samples proteomic biomarkers directly at the plaque site, generating data that cannot be obtained through conventional systemic blood sampling, according to PlaqueTec executives.

The company’s ongoing BIOPATTERN trial is generating proteomic data across a growing patient cohort, with several potential targets identified in sub-groups accounting for the majority of the studied coronary artery disease population.

Atherosclerotic disease causes plaque build-up that narrows or blocks the arteries that supply blood to the heart, brain and limbs, and is a leading cause of death globally. Current treatment approaches are largely one-size-fits-all and therefore ineffective for many patients. To address this, PlaqueTec has developed a proprietary technology and data analysis platform to endotype patients and uncover potential biomarkers of coronary vascular function and plaque progression. The company is based at the Babraham Research Campus, Cambridge, United Kingdom.