Massachusetts-based Portal Biotechnologies, Inc., a cell engineering and drug discovery platform company, has closed an oversubscribed USD 9 million financing round led by NFX, with participation from existing investors IA Ventures, Pear VC, Undeterred Ventures, IKJ Capital, and TechU Ventures.
The company said proceeds will accelerate commercial scaling of its Portal mechanoporation platform across three areas: novel drug discovery workflows, AI-driven biological data generation, and next-generation cell therapy manufacturing. No prior funding rounds were disclosed in the announcement.
Portal's platform uses mechanoporation — a physical, non-viral method of transiently disrupting cell membranes — to deliver RNA, gene editors, probes, and other complex molecules into cell types that are typically difficult to transfect. The approach is designed to avoid the immunogenicity and cargo limitations associated with viral vectors and electroporation, enabling multi-perturbation experiments and high-throughput screening in physiologically relevant cell models.
The company reported surpassing 100 customer sites, including disclosed engagements with Merck, AbbVie, and Purdue University for drug discovery applications, and a two-year collaboration with the Ragon Institute of Harvard/MIT/Mass General Brigham and Microsoft to generate immune response training data for AI models. Mass General Brigham also presented data at the American Society of Cell and Gene Therapy annual meeting on same-day, circular RNA-based CAR-T production using the platform.