Curate Biosciences is a San Diego-based life sciences tools company developing a transformative bioprocessing platform technology for next generation cell & gene therapies. Curate’s system utilizes a proprietary microfluidic technology that gently separates and isolates cells based on size, providing a faster path to cleaner and larger quantities of starting cells, solving for a critical bottleneck in gene and cell therapies. Optimized for processing apheresis and cell culture samples, the platform yields larger quantities of healthier, naive leukocytes while halving manufacturing time using the world’s fastest available microfluidic technology with additional potential for increasing persistence in gene edited cell therapies.
EXECUTIVE BUILD
LEAD ultimately placed (4) Board and C-suite roles at Curate Biosciences, including Chief Executive Officer, David Backer; NED Board members Daniel Getts, CEO of Myeloid Therapeutics and Mayo Pujols, CTO at Rocket Pharmaceuticals, former CEO Andelyn Biosciences; and Chief Business Officer, Gaurav Vij.
THE CHALLENGE
After placing Curate’s Chief Business Officer, Gaurav Vij, our team was tasked with leading (2) Board Director remits and a CEO engagement in support of commercializing Curate’s novel and deterministic cell processing system.
THE SOLUTION
LEAD began working with Curate’s nominating + governance board members post-Series C raise with investments from Vensana Capital and Amgen Ventures. The CEO engagement and both board remits were executed in parallel, for which we balanced multiple phenotypes spanning commercial, strategic, and technical operators from CGT tools + therapeutics settings. LEAD’s team brought to bear a deep network and understanding of the CGT space, also a personal passion and vested interest in advancing solutions with the potential to augment clinical efficacy and solve for critical challenges in cell therapy manufacturing.
IMPACT
Curate’s cell processing system has successfully been validated by 10+ partners from academic centers, biotechnology companies, and CDMOs, including City of Hope’s integration of Curate’s system into its manufacturing workflow for investigational CAR-T cell immunotherapies.