JULY 14, 2009--Accuri Cytometers Inc. (Ann Arbor, MI) says it has competed a $4 million Series D financing round, which included current investors Fidelity Biosciences, Flagship Ventures, Baird Venture Partners and Arboretum Ventures, as well as the InvestMichigan! Program co-managed by Credit Suisse. Accuri will use the proceeds to provide additional working and growth capital to support the rapid market acceptance of the Accuri C6 Flow Cytometer System, a product designed to bring the power of flow cytometry analysis to the laboratory of every life science researcher, and the recently introduced Accuri CSampler, an optional accessory that adds user-friendly automation to the C6 system.
"With our first two products experiencing rapid market acceptance and our European operations newly underway, we have secured additional capital to build out our manufacturing and customer support capabilities in Michigan and to continue to expand our commercial presence globally," said Jennifer Baird, CEO of Accuri. "In these challenging times, we are gratified that all of our existing investors chose to participate in the Series D financing at a higher valuation. We are especially pleased that the InvestMichigan! Program, co-managed by Credit Suisse and championed by Governor Jennifer Granholm, became a significant new investor."
Specially designed for routine use by biomedical researchers in their own labs, Accuri's flow cytometer is a full-featured bench-top cell analysis system that promises capabilities similar to industry-leading flow cytometers in a more user-friendly format and at a fraction of the cost. The newly introduced CSampler makes the Accuri C6 Flow Cytometer suitable for high throughput applications, further extending its potential market reach.
"Customer response in the Accuri C6 Flow Cytometer's first year on the market has exceeded our expectations for this revolutionary product," said Harry Wilcox, Partner at Flagship Ventures and a Director of Accuri. "Current investors welcomed the opportunity to provide additional capital to help fuel the company's accelerating growth and we are pleased that a new investor, the InvestMichigan! Program, participated in the financing."
Accuri user Steven McClellan, Senior Biological Scientist at the Flow Cytometry Core Laboratory at the University of Florida, notes, "The Accuri C6 is a transformative product, providing high performance flow cytometry in an affordable, easy-to-use format that makes it accessible to almost all researchers. And the story gets even better. In recent toxicity studies that relied on the system's uniquely wide dynamic range, our lab was able to conduct experiments that previously had not been successful using a traditional cytometer available in our core facility. Affordable and accessible, and with improved capabilities, too!"
For more information visit Accuri Cytometers' website.
Posted by Barbara G. Goode, [email protected], for BioOptics World.