Biolinq raises an extra $4.75M in series A for trials of its painless diabetes sensor

Biolinq has tacked on an extra $4.75 million to the total of its series A round to help fund additional clinical trials and development of its coin-sized sensor patch for monitoring blood glucose levels and other biomarkers.

The additional investments were led by the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation’s T1D Fund as well as Aphelion Capital and LifeSci Venture Partners. They join the San Diego-based company’s previous main backers, M Ventures and Hikma Ventures, who helped Biolinq secure $10 million in its initial series A raise in December 2017, alongside Grey Sky Venture Partners, Three Leaf Ventures and other individual investors.

Biolinq hopes its biosensor patch will become a painless, needle-free method for continuously measuring blood glucose levels. By using a silicon-based microarray to tap into biomarkers in the interstitial fluid, the battery-powered patch is designed to wirelessly feed the information to a smartphone app. In a statement, Biolinq CEO Jared Tangney said the company completed its first clinical study last year.

“We are impressed with the initial clinical results Biolinq has achieved with their very promising technology,” Katie Ellias, managing director at the JDRF T1D Fund, said in the statement.

“We believe the company is well positioned to set new standards for minimally invasive CGMs and are excited to support Biolinq during this critical phase as they work towards bringing next-gen solutions to market and explore future applications for people living with type 1 diabetes,” Ellias added.

Biolinq also announced it brought on Tom Peyser to serve as senior vice president of scientific, clinical and regulatory affairs as the company pursues additional clinical trials and commercialization. Peyser was previously a VP of science and technology at Dexcom and more recently was co-founder and chief scientist at artificial pancreas developer Mode AGC, as well as a medical device consultant.